City spends ₹30 crore annually to close 30,000 potholes: BBMP

This only throws light on underlying problems, including corruption, argue experts

Chief Civic Commissioner Tushar Giri Nath on Tuesday said that on an average, the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) spends ₹30 crore to close over 30,000 potholes on the city’s streets, raising many eyebrows. While many in the civic body suggested this was an underestimate too, several activists and experts have questioned why the BBMP is unable to address the underlying problem. 

A senior traffic police said the unscientific design of the roads causing water logging was one of the main reasons for potholes, and despite several appeals, the civic body had failed to resolve these issues holistically. “Unless you fix this issue, potholes will keep appearing and the city will keep spending crores of rupees to fill them, for them to only reappear with a brief spell of rain again,” he said.

The Bengaluru Traffic Police had flagged over 110 prominent waterlogging spots on the city’s main roads that blocked traffic and caused potholes. “The civic body has attended to some of them, some partially. But these are design problems and shoddy work and need to be fixed. Why is there waterlogging on the newly-built Smart City Roads? Fixing the road topography to prevent waterlogging will reduce the menace of potholes to a large extent,” he said. 

However, the recurrence of potholes points to low quality of work and underlying corruption.

Srikanth Channal, Chairman, Association of Consulting Civil Engineers, Bengaluru, said the very admission of so many potholes every year only indicates poor quality of work and corruption. “A third party audit was introduced to ensure quality of work. However, this has been undone in the city as the same authority executes work and takes reports of the third party audit. Thus, low quality of work and corruption remains unaddressed,” he said, suggesting that ideally, the third party audit of the quality of work should report to the Urban Development Department directly.  

Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai had in September 2021 revealed that the government had spent a whopping ₹20,000 crore on the city’s roads in the last five years. His government has also come under severe criticism over allegations of ‘40% commission’ in all contracts in the State, including the city, by D. Kempanna, president, Karnataka State Contractors’ Association.