BBMP
sources said Lakshminarayana recently held a meeting with the
additional commissioners, joint commissioners, zonal commissioners and
chief engineers, where he directed them that, henceforth, he would not
entertain any civil work at ward level without road history.

Although
BBMP had a tradition of keeping road history, most of the Palike
engineers never mentioned them while floating tenders and executing
works.
This they had been doing apparently to embezzle public money.
To keep tabs on such practices, Lakshminarayana has issued the
instruction.

Speaking to Deccan Herald, Lakshminarayana said the
engineers had been told to feed the road history of their wards in the
computer data, which will go online very soon.

Identifying contractors

Lakshminarayana
said, “With road history, we will be able to check duplication of works
and asphalting of a road again and again in a short span of time. Road
history will tell us which contractor and engineer had done the civil
work on a particular stretch of road. This way, we can identify the
contractor for good or bad reason.”

Palike sources said the
Palike engineers, corporators and contractors have been opposing the
Geographical Information System-based road history for the last three to
four years.

They had blocked its implementation so far as it
would have choked their ‘revenue,’ but a detailed investigation into
1,972 frozen works worth Rs 522 crore necessitated the BBMP to push for
it again.

The Palike engineers will have to feed information about their wards, roads and works executed there in the last five years.