State of play
Nearly two years have passed since the term of Bengaluru’s civic body, Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP), ended and bureaucrats took over. But elections are nowhere in sight for the civic body, even as political parties are getting all set for the Assembly polls. A petition by former Congress councillors seeking directions to the State government to hold civic polls is pending before the Supreme Court. Though the ruling BJP claims elections have been delayed only to bring in governance reforms, the BBMP Act, 2020, a dedicated law for the city’s governance, has been criticised for doing “too little.”
There are allegations that the civic polls have been deliberately delayed to further strengthen the MLAs, who, in the absence of an elected civic body, have been calling the shots in Bengaluru. The new Act, for instance, provides for an advisory committee led by MLAs at the Assembly constituency level, which many fear will only institutionalise the control MLAs have over Bengaluru, in contravention to the spirit of the 74th Amendment.
