Old mess and a new 'waste' body

Bengaluru will soon have another infrastructure agency to ‘manage’ the city.

Welcome the Bengaluru Solid Waste Management Limited (BSWML). Just approved by the state Cabinet, the BSWML will be responsible for the collection, transportation and processing of waste from households and commercial establishments in the city. Additionally, the new entity will also be responsible for managing the waste processing plants and the newer waste-to-energy (WtE) proposals under consideration.

Why has this happened? Because the BBMP, which has by all accounts made a remarkable mess of waste management in the city (no pun intended), will no longer be in charge of solid waste management. Reports, however, suggest that the Additional Chief Secretary of Urban Development Department will be the chairman and BBMP Commissioner the co-chairman of the new company.

So, will the BSWML become another parastatal agency with no locally elected representatives for consultations and not accountable to the citizenry of Bengaluru? Also, since it is the BBMP’s obligatory functions as a corporation to clean public roads and places, clear sewage and garbage and disposal, construct and maintain drains, construct and maintain roads and bridges, pavements and streetlights, solid waste management, tree planting etc, what will the overlap in roles with the BSWML be and will confusion ensue?

In the last decade or so, front page headlines in Bengaluru have always involved an issue with the BBMP or BDA or BMRCL or BESCOM or one of the other many parastatal agencies in this city (Pothole-ridden roads need immediate attention; HC orders BBMP to give details of garbage work orders; Solid waste management: Mining landfills may be eco-friendly, but BBMP struggles to kick-start it). The problem is that the issues are usually the same but in different locations in the city and they repeat themselves ad nauseum every few weeks.

Between the increasingly aware and vocal citizenry, non-government civic agencies and the media focus on infrastructure lacunae in the city, one would imagine that lessons would have been learnt; that structural change would be on the anvil and not just superficial panacea to problems. Bengaluru is one of the few cities that truly has the capacity and temperament for substantive change.

Like in the rest of India, state bureaucrats control civic agencies in Bengaluru. This results in the constant erosion of the functional domain of these bodies, contrary to the 74th Constitutional Amendment Act, which delegates decision-making powers to local governments and mandates the involvement of residents, with an aim to bridge the gap between the government and the people.

Voice of the people

Similar to other municipal corporations across the country, the BBMP is being pushed towards change by non-government and civic agencies across the city and now, to an extent, by the courts. The voices of the people in the city to make them part of the political decision-making process are getting louder and more strident. While no one is really in-charge of the city or accountable to the citizens for delivery of services, the municipal government is being pushed into a corner almost every week. Opaque non-participatory decisions are being revoked almost monthly by civic protests or court rulings (see revocation of Turahalli tree park order, saving of 872 trees along the Nagawara-Gottigere metro alignment etc) and the decisions of the municipal government are under constant scrutiny.

So, will the decision to set up the BSWML be yet another step that will be scrapped in the long run? More significantly, the question is, why is the government wasting its time, energy and effort by constantly churning out unrealistic ideas like this instead of actually engaging in true reform that is urgently needed and making this city a harbinger of the tenets of the 74th amendment.

To enable ‘local self-government’ and participatory processes, it is necessary to reform the colonial era’s Karnataka Municipal Corporation Act, 1976, and the Karnataka Municipalities Act, 1964. By doing so, the mayor’s powers will not be overseen by a commissioner appointed by the state government and s/he will be more than a ceremonial position.

Additionally, reforms to remove state approvals above small amounts should be made. The state should facilitate better governance by redefining the jurisdictions and roles of all parastatal agencies in the city so that they act in concert rather than at odds with each other (no more roads being dug up for new sewage lines by BBMP only to be dug up by BESCOM for electric cables, a month later); transfer public transport (bus and metro services) under local government.

Municipal governments across the country lack mechanisms to provide sufficient housing, healthcare, sanitation etc, due to a paucity of funds. The state government should be fighting the Centre for a more equitable share of revenues for the state and city. Till we decentralise municipal governance and make it reflective of democratic and participatory tenets, agencies like the Bengaluru Solid Waste Management Limited are only going to produce more chaos and avenues to blame for the literal mess that Bengaluru is in.

(The writer is an urban planner in Bengaluru)