The Hindu             26.06.2013

BBMP may launch frozen schemes

The 1,970 works worth Rs. 522 crore that were deemed
unnecessary and frozen may soon be launched. Several councillors had
objected to the decision to freeze these schemes.

On
Tuesday, Bruhat Bangalore Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) Commissioner M.
Lakshminarayan announced that these schemes may be taken up in two
phases. This decision was taken after a meeting with district in-charge
and Transport Minister Ramalinga Reddy on Monday.

Mr.
Lakshminarayan said that in the first phase, flood prevention schemes
and those for which work orders had been issued would be taken up. The
remaining would be taken up after a pre-audit and verification under the
second phase.

Mr. Lakshminarayan clarified that
these schemes had not been scrapped, only frozen. He claimed that 22,800
schemes were in progress in the city. “If all the 1,970 schemes are
taken up now without any pre-audit or verification, it will become
difficult for the BBMP to monitor them,” he said.

Justifying
the decision to conduct the pre-audit, he said the government had
issued an order stating that all schemes worth over Rs. 5 lakh had to be
subjected to pre-audit. “It is imperative that we follow the procedure
laid down by the government. If the project is essential, there should
not be any problem in taking it up,” he added.

He
said that there was need to ascertain if the BBMP had the financial
wherewithal to take up these additional schemes. The BBMP had pending
bills amounting to Rs. 1,265 crore and the contractors were constantly
demanding their dues.

Mayor D. Venkatesh Murthy urged Mr. Lakshminarayan to use a uniform yardstick while conducting the pre-audit.

Earlier,
Ruling Party Leader N. Nagaraju said that many schemes that were
already taken up were in limbo, which was inconveniencing citizens. K.
Gopalaiah, Mahalakshmi Layout MLA, sought to know why the BBMP had to
freeze schemes taken up with government funds. Several BJP councillors,
including Pattabhiramanagar councillor C.K. Ramamurthy and Rajajinagar
councillor H.R. Krishnappa, objected to the pre-audit of the frozen
schemes.

It may be recalled that during the previous
council meeting, the councillors, cutting across party lines, objected
to the BBMP’s decision to freeze 1,970 schemes. The Technical Vigilance
Cell under Commissioner (TVCC) had deemed these schemes, sanctioned
under special grants from government, MLAs, Mayor, Deputy Mayor and 12
standing committees, unnecessary.