Times have changed and with time, even the government officials and elected representatives have changed. Take this for example; meeting a corporation official is difficult during daytime but yesterday the whole lot of corporation officers with MLA and councilor were there to make a survey of road to be widened at night in the dark.

Late in the evening a host of cars stopped suddenly in front of the Shahpur police station and all the by standers had some great ideas about they, coming over there.

MLA Abhay Patil & Firoz Sait, Mayor, Dy.Mayor, corporation commissioner S G Patil and other officers were seen discussing about the road widening from Nath Pai circle to Vadgaon. According to sources, the road will be widened to 60 feet.

Citizens were around were amazed at the officials surveying the area at night. In addition, one senior citizen at the spot said, times have changed.

Hope times have changed for the good and not for any other reasons.

District minister Basavraj Bommai was here yesterday to review all the works taken under the special grant from the CM and also other works going on in the city to make it Mega city.
The minister this time said that he will urge the CM to give another 100 crore for the development of the city.

100 core Special grant usage:

Rs.78 crore 59 lakhs 318 have been allocated for work

Belgaum North Constituency – works worth 25 crore are being undertaken

Belgaum South constituency – works worth 39 crore are being undertaken
Minister urged the starting of the Ring road project and said he will follow the matter with the CM. He also said that there was need for a hall where Kanada program could be held and for the same he will inspect Kalamandir so that a hi-tech hall could be made.

There are 60 marriage halls Kalyan mantaps in the city and they have not taken any permission from the city corporation.

This fact was revealed as a reply to a RTI application to Bhagojirao Patil & Bhaskar Pharfod. Out of these halls a few are running for over 40 to 50 years and they haven’t paid any fees to the corporation. How this has happened and the corporation has lost its income for so many years, who is responsible for this loss is yet to be answered.

The Cantonment board has decided to give a facelift to the Gogte Circle (near Railway station). Bank of India has agreed to pay Rs.3.5 lakhs for the same and hence the board approved the renovation of the circle.

An island will be made and other amenities will be provided.

 Karnataka Urban Water Supply and Sewerage Board (KUWSSB) took a break for its annual maintenance work all of a sudden and for the fourth day in a row many parts of the city did not get any water.

KUWSSB was supplying water once in three days to the city barring the 24×7 wards, but even the 24×7 wards have been affected.

The annual maintenance is being carried out for pipeline repair works and patching the leakages at Hidkal.  Taking stock of this grave situation the private water suppliers are making swift money. They charged Rs. 500 for one tanker of water when the normal rate is between Rs. 350 and Rs. 400.

Hopefully, water supply would be restored by Saturday morning.

 A decision has been taken in Bangalore to extend 24/7 drinking water supply scheme to all wards of Hubli-Dharwad, Belgaum and Gulbarga city corporations, and work on the scheme would be commence in a couple of months. Now, the scheme has been successfully implemented on a pilot basis in eight wards of three corporations and the Department has decided to cover all wards in three corporations, which would solve the water problem, in three corporations. Karnataka Urban Water Supply and Sewerage Board is implementing the said scheme.

 Hence, all the wards will get 24×7 water supply once the scheme is implemented. Presently only 8 wards get 24×7 water supply where as other wards get water once in two days.

Related posts: Water Tariff hiked for 24×7 wards

 Water Prices increase by a whopping 42%

This is the irony of the civic authorities. Anyone can know this and see this, but the Civic authorities (BCC) have gone blind.

The Karnataka Housing board (KHB) is constructing huge towers near the railway over bridge, and form an RTI application it has come out that the Corporation has not given the requisite permission to KHB build the towers, even then the construction work is in full swing with work being done day and night. To, top the icing on the cake Shri. S. G. Patil, Commissioner of BCC did not even know that such construction was in progress.

 Construction started in late October and the building will be utilized for residential purposes for the government employees.  The KHB has sought permission for the construction from BCC but they haven’t got it still.

 The BCC goes on a demolition drive when they see small encroachments but are they blind here?

 Photo: Team AAB

 Related earlier posts posted on 12 November 2008

The Belgaum Goa road which is dire straits within the borders of Karnataka will now not be made into a 4 lane road as was planned earlier. To add to this nor is the Belgaum Chorla Goa road be done as the High court has stayed the work on a PIL.

The NH 4 A Belgaum Khanapur- Rmanagar- Anmod Goa highway was planned to be 4 a lane road but now it will be only 10 meters wide, in some places it is 5 to 7 meters now. A survey was done and as per the suggestions of the survey this road will now be a 10 meter road as per the National highways department.  

Majority of the said road was to be in the green forest belt and there were practical problems for widening near Khanapur. Also another reason cited for not widening is another route Belgaum Chorla Goa route which will hamper the BOT (build operate Transfer) scheme. As there is an alternative road people would use that and toll collections would be hit.

The reason cited by the company surveying is economically correct but now the Chorla road work has also come to stand still after a order of the court on a PIL for saving the forest land. The 51 kms stretch from Peeranwadi to Chorla is though reserve forest land and the PIL made the same point as to how can the reserve forest land are used for roads.

Now for the common man it’s a loose loose situation. Nor this road nor that road, Anmod patch is in very bad condition still and with just 3 months for rains if nothing is done immediately you have it reaching Goa would be a great adventure. Even today most of the commuters take the Belgaum Savantawadi Goa route.

Let’s pray to God that the road be made as early as possible.

Input Source: Tarun bharat

I had earlier posted the chaotic situation of RPD cross, nothing has changed till date, except for a new Bus bay which is made by using the Traffic barricades.

However, the City buses hardly use them and normally stop before the barricades itself, which causes traffic jam, as it occupies a major part of the road.

If the traffic constable is not around the Bus bay, area is normally used for parking.

The road is wide enough but it should be properly made and proper implementation of the traffic sense will solve many problems of the circle.

The barricades are causing a nuisance on the road, and one better thing about them is that the said barricades are moved if some VIP is coming to town, as they are needed somewhere else. Therefore, the authorities should look into the matter and make some permanent arrangements.

 The Belgaum city corporation in a landmark decision has taken a step to put stickers with ‘TNP’ (Tax Not Paid) on all those properties who have not paid their property tax.

This is a new novel method opted by the corporation but how much it will help in actually collecting taxes needs to be seen.

Source: Express Buzz

For many years the government was not looking into the issues related to development and infrastructure in Belgaum. But off late the successive governments are taking a keen interest in the development of Belgaum which is mainly propelled by the influence and efforts of various organizations. Unluckily none of the politicians from Belgaum have played any role in pressurizing the government; it is the successful efforts of the Organizations that have helped.

The Belgaum City Corporation under different grants has done many road works. Funds from flood relief, 17.80 crores from SFC grant, and 14 crores from World Kannada meet, Special fund before Belgaum’s winter sessions. The main roads and other roads works have been completed. In fact some roads have been re-done before the maintenance periods got over.

The 100 crore grant is an additional grant to the BCC for overall development of Belgaum City. The Highlights of the present action plan is only on Roads, more than 90% of the grant is to be utilized for Roads and the remaining 10% for drains and electrical works.

See earlier post related to this here.

Why have they not considered other infrastructure which the city badly needs?

The market area needs multi level parking, Widening of Roads, beautification of existing parks, Amusement parks, under passes(near Court compound and elsewhere), over bridges, Bus shelters, Community Halls, etc. The development of city does not only mean building roads. We also need other infrastructure in place.

When people demand for infrastructure Corporation officials & authorities say there are no funds, but when funds are available they are misutilized for wrong purposes. How many times to do they want to build the same roads again and again?

The proposed action plan was planned by private engineers it is said. The corporation has not bothered to see if the road works proposed in this action plan are due for work or they are still in the maintenance period.

The Karnataka Rakshane Vedike is demanding to stop the tendering process and scrap the existing action plan and come up with a new comprehensive action plan which provides opportunity for:

Construction of multi level parking

 Widening of Roads

Beautification of existing parks

Amusement parks

Under passes (near Court compound and elsewhere)

Over bridges

Bus shelters

Community Halls

 Before the action plan is re proposed they should have a meeting of all organizations and take their opinion and they should have some professional urban planning firms to advice and overlook on the works.

The KRV was protesting with the same at the Corporation office, but to my surprise no one covered the news. I have no idea why this is so? I am just doing this after getting inputs from KRV and I guess what they have stated is correct, Why only roads build other infrastructure also using those 100 crores. The KRV added that the above mentioned infrastructural developments are only a few which the city needs, there could be many more.

It was also felt that the citizens of Belgaum should come together under a common platform for the development of Belgaum. All the citizens’ forums working in the city and the public at large should take keen interest in the development of the city.

I request readers to comment on this and debate heavily; after all it’s our own tax payer’s money that will be utilized here again.