By V.S. Karnic, IANS,
Bangalore: The Karnataka capital’s civic body is much maligned, justifiably so as its record on the matters it deals with is dismal. Unfortunately, thousands of Bangaloreans are proving they are no better when it comes to doing their bit to keep the city’s flag flying.
While the city is still struggling to find a lasting solution to the garbage mess that has rocked it for several months since July last year, the revelation comes that thousands of people are not paying the property tax and only a few have responded to frequent pleas of officials as well as citizenry concerned to harvest rain water.
The Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike or Greater Bangalore City Corporation (BBMP) says there are more than 300,000 property owners in the city who have tax arrears totalling nearly Rs.800 crore.
The city is divided into 198 wards, with each ward electing a representative on the BBMP.
BBMP commissioner Siddaiah, a senior Indian Administrative Officer, said early this week that on an average, around Rs.five crore property tax is due from each ward.
The Bangaloreans’ record on rain water harvesting (RWH) is worse.
The city has around one million properties – residential and commercial – which should adopt rain water harvesting, according to the state government. The government made RWH mandatory for these buildings in July 2011.
Of this whopping number, only 44,740 have gone in for RWH, Law Minister S. Suresh Kumar, who also looks after the Bangalore Water Supply and Sewerage Board (BWSSB), said early this week.
This abysmal response is in the face of repeated warnings by experts that Bangalore would face water famine by 2020 if RWH and other measures to conserve water are not implemented at the earliest.
The BBMP has begun talking tough to make defaulters pay up.
It plans to shame them – by displaying in public places and through media the names of the defaulters if they don’t pay up by March 31 this year.
The BBMP has started shaming the defaulters in a small way.
In the recent past it sent a group of drum beaters to a tech park, a major IT firm and a star hotel to kick up noise and draw the attention of not only owners but passersby as well.
Siddaiah says drum-beating has made these owners pay part of the due tax.
However, there is no such plan from the government side on enforcing RWH implementation.
The government had threatened to disconnect water and sewage lines of those not going in for RWH. But that has not been done and there is no indication from when the proposal will be implemented.
Bangalore is now home to nearly nine million people and one of the booming sectors in the city is realty with dozens of huge multi-storeyed residential complexes coming up in both the central business district and the suburbs.
The boom follows the city becoming a major hub of software outsourcing which attracted and continues to bring in thousands of people from across the country.
The influx is having a cascading effect with demands for both property and human resources to manage the growing hospitality, healthcare, education and other sectors.
(V.S. Karnic can be contacted at [email protected])