Greater Bengaluru Governance Bill tabled in Karnataka Assembly
Bengaluru, Jul 23: The Karnataka government on Tuesday tabled the Greater Bengaluru Governance Bill which aims at establishing a maximum of 10 city corporations in order to decentralise municipal administration.
The bill moots the founding of the Greater Bengaluru Authority (GBA) in which the chief minister will be the ex-officio chairperson, the minister in charge of Bengaluru will be the vice-chairperson and the chief commissioner of the Greater Bengaluru Authority will be the ex-officio member secretary.
Karnataka ministers holding home, urban development, transport and energy portfolios and ministers from Bengaluru will be the ex-officio members.
Apart from them, the mayors of the city corporations, two members from each city corporation nominated by city corporation members will a part of the GBA as members.
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Bangalore Development Authority commissioner, Bangalore Water Supply and Sewerage Board chairperson, and managing directors of Bangalore Metro Rail Corporation Limited, Bengaluru Solid Waste Management Limited and Bangalore Electricity Supply Company, as well as Bengaluru police commissioner, chief executive officer of the Bengaluru Metropolitan Land Transport Authority, chief town planner and engineer-in-chief of GBA, and the director of Karnataka State Fire and Emergency Services will be the ex-officio members.
The commissioners of the city corporations will also be GBA ex-officio members but will not have voting rights.
All members of the House of the People and state Legislative Assembly whose constituencies lie within or substantially within the Greater Bengaluru Area shall be permanent invitees to the Greater Bengaluru Authority and may attend the meeting but will not have the right to vote, according to the bill.
The chief commissioner will be an officer not below the rank of additional chief secretary.
There will be city corporation authorities comprising of a mayor, commissioner, joint commissioners as well as standing committees, zonal committees, ward committees and ‘area sabhas’.
The mayor and the deputy mayor will hold office for a period of five years and it shall be co-terminus with the term of the office of the city corporation.
The BJP opposed the bill in the Karnataka Assembly saying it will divide Bengaluru further and its identity will be lost.
However, Deputy Chief Minister D K Shivakumar, who is in charge of Bengaluru Development, dismissed the apprehensions of the opposition leaders as baseless.
He said he has only tabled the bill and it has not been passed yet. He added that he would take everyone along while forming the GBA.
Shivakumar said there will be a meeting on July 27 with all the legislators from Bengaluru and the ministers on this issue to clear all doubts.
BJP leader and former councilor Padmanabha Reddy commented that this bill in fact centralises the municipal corporations instead of decentralising city governance.
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Five killed in fresh violence in Manipur's Jiribam
Imphal/Kolkata (PTI): Five people were killed in fresh violence in Manipur's Jiribam district on Saturday morning, police said.
One person was shot dead in his sleep while four others were killed in subsequent exchange of fire between armed men of two warring communities, a police officer said.
Militants entered the house of the person who lived alone in an isolated location around 5 km from the district headquarters and shot him dead in his sleep, he said.
After the killing, a heavy exchange of fire broke out between armed men of the warring communities in the hills around 7 km from the district headquarters, leading to the deaths of four armed persons, including three hills-based militants, the officer said.
Further details are awaited.
Earlier this week, fresh arson broke out in the district after suspected "village volunteers" burnt down an abandoned three-room house of a retired police officer at Jakuradhor in Borobekra police station said.
Tribal body Indigenous Tribes Advocacy Committee (Pherzawl and Jiribam) denied any involvement in the incident.
The district witnessed fresh violence despite representatives of the Meitei and Hmar communities reaching an agreement to restore normalcy and "prevent incidents of arson and firing" in a meeting held at a CRPF facility in adjoining Assam's Cachar on August 1.
In the meeting moderated by the Jiribam district administration, Assam Rifles and CRPF personnel, and representatives of Hmar, Meitei, Thadou, Paite and Mizo communities of Jiribam district were also present.
The agreement was, however, denounced by several Hmar tribal bodies based outside Jiribam district saying they did not have any knowledge about it.
More than 200 people have been killed and thousands rendered homeless in ethnic violence between Imphal Valley-based Meiteis and adjoining hills-based Kuki-Zo groups since May last year.
Ethnically-diverse Jiribam, which was largely untouched by ethnic violence in Imphal Valley and adjoining hills, erupted in violence after a 59-year-old man belonging to one community was killed allegedly by militants of another community in June this year. Thousands had to leave their homes and relocate to relief camps due to incidents of arson by both sides. A CRPF jawan was also killed in an ambush by militants during patrolling by security forces in mid-July.
