If BBMP had used time wisely, Bengaluru could have been pothole-free: Karnataka high court

BENGALURU: striking the BBMP for not utilising the 34-day period to fix potholes in the city, the high court said: “In the one-month-plus (time) since September 19, Bengaluru city could have been freed of potholes if BBMP had worked. 

During Dasara holidays, traffic was less. Even otherwise, you could have arranged things with traffic police.”The bench’s observation came after the BBMP counsel failed to confirm if the city was free of potholes. 

The bench made senior advocate Aditya Sondhi, recently co-opted as a member of the high-level committee involving the chief secretary, to see that preference is accorded to pothole-filling work in the panel’s deliberations.

The bench approached the court commissioners — MG Uma, member-secretary, Karnataka State Legal Services Authority, and Dinesh Agrawal, superintending engineer, CWE (army), Military Engineer Services, Bengaluru — to visit places where the BBMP is holding pothole-filling work over the next two days and nights and report to the court on October 25, the next date of hearing.

The petitioners have produced pictorials to show work hadn’t been undertaken at 43 places. V Sreenidhi, counsel for BBMP, informed the court the BWSSB had undertaken work at 24 locations. 

Sreenidhi said work had been completed in 14 of the remaining 19 places. The bench asked the court commissioners to report on the status of work at the 19 places. 

It requested Agrawal to give suggestions for the high-level committee’s take.

Not satisfied with the BBMP’s response, Chief Justice Dinesh Maheshwari said “a considerable amount of judicial time” is being taken by the PIL. 

With this matter ‘acting like a pothole’, the court has been not able to take up many other issues, he said. The CJ hinted at Saturday hearings of pothole PIL so that other cases get their court time.