A legislative proposal to break up the Greater Bengaluru urban local body into several smaller bodies will be discussed at a meeting of all lawmakers from the city on Saturday.
BJP MLAs protested after The Greater Bengaluru Governance Bill, 2024 was tabled in the Karnataka Assembly on Tuesday (July 23), saying the proposal to restructure the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) was against the interests of the city.
Deputy Chief Minister and Bengaluru Development Minister D K Shivakumar said the Bill would be discussed on July 27, suggesting it would not be taken up in the ongoing session of the Assembly that ends on Friday (July 26).
Official sources said the Bill will be likely scrutinised by a sub-committee comprising lawmakers from all parties before it is taken up by the House.
It is relevant to mention that an experiment to trifurcate the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) in 2012 was not successful, and the civic body was reunified in 2022.
What is The Greater Bengaluru Governance Bill?
The Bill was drafted by the BBMP Restructuring Committee, which was formed in November 2014 during Siddaramaiah’s earlier term as Chief Minister. After the committee submitted its report in 2015, the government brought a Bill to split the BBMP into smaller corporations. But it was forced to shelve the proposal after the BJP protested.
In 2018, the committee submitted a draft Greater Bengaluru Governance Bill to the government. After Siddaramaiah returned to power, the committee was reconvened in June 2023, with retired IAS officer B S Patil as chairman. In June 2024, the committee made a presentation to MLAs from Bengaluru at a meeting chaired by the Chief Minister.
A week before the monsoon session of the Assembly began on July 15, the panel submitted a modified draft of the Bill to Shivakumar.
What has the Bill proposed?
The Bill says the number of city corporations in the Greater Bengaluru Area “shall not exceed ten”. Official sources said the BBMP will be likely split into five units based on criteria specified in the proposed legislation.
The governance structure will be three-tier, with the Greater Bengaluru Authority (GBA) above the corporations. Below the corporations will be the ward committees.
The GBA, headed by the Chief Minister, will have 21 members, including the Ministers for Bengalurue Development, Home, and Urban Development, city MLAs, and the chiefs of organisations such as the Bangalore Development Authority (BDA), Bangalore Water Supply and Sewerage Board (BWSSB), and Bengaluru Metropolitan Transport Corporation (BMTC), etc.
Among the criteria specified in the Bill for a city corporation are: a population of 10 lakh or more with a population density of more than 5,000 people per sq km; a minimum revenue generation of Rs 300 cr per annum; and more than 50% of the total employment being in non-agricultural activities.
“Local areas” can be included in the proposed city corporations under the Authority. The government is empowered to decide which area will fall under which corporation. However, the Bill does not provide a definition of local area.
The Bill says that the number of wards in each city corporation “shall not be more than two hundred and not less than fifty”.The (undivided) BBMP currently has 198 wards.
Apart from the elected representatives, 10% of councillors will be nominated by the government from among “persons having special knowledge and experience in municipal administration or matters relating to health, town planning or education”, or “who are social workers”. Nominated councillors will not have the right to vote in meetings of the corporation.
What taxes can the city corporations levy?
Under the provisions of the Bill, city corporations can collect a wide variety of taxes, cesses and other duties. The Bill mentions the following: property tax on land and buildings; service charges for properties exempted from property tax; fee on advertisements; tax on professions, trades, callings and employments; solid waste management cess; infrastructure cess; urban land transport cess; Greater Bengaluru Authority cess; and duty on transfer of immovable property in the form of additional stamp duty.
Revenues are a crucial factor. The development of any large urban conglomerate is uneven, and one of the main reasons why the move to split the MCD in Delhi failed was that while the South Delhi Municipal Corporation was flush with cash, the North and East Corporations were struggling badly.
So what is the BJP’s criticism of the Bill, and the government’s response?
The BJP says the Bill is “unscientific”. Leader of Opposition R Ashok also alleged that “Kannada will disappear from Bengaluru (if the Bill is passed)”, and that “pro-Kannada groups are opposed to the legislation”. Kempe Gowda, the founder of Bengaluru, would “curse” the ploy to divide the city into smaller parts, according to the BJP leader.
Another senior BJP leader, S Suresh Kumar, who is the MLA from Rajajinagar, demanded that the government should appoint a committee consisting of Bengaluru city MLAs to study the Bill.
Deputy Chief Minister Shivakumar, who piloted the Bill, said the legislation was required because the government was “not able to change the existing system” in Bengaluru. The city was growing in a haphazard manner, and the government was not able to control it, he said.
Shivakumar said the large influx of people from outside Karnataka was fuelling the growth of the city. The population of Bengaluru had grown from 70 lakh to 1.4 cr in a little more than two decades, he said.
Shivakumar said that a comprehensive discussion on the Bill would take place on July 27, and that he was “not seeking an immediate passage of the Bill”.
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