Plan panel to take a leaf from BATF book

Plan panel to take a leaf from BATF book
The Financial Express

BANGALORE, DEC 13: Karnataka chief minister Dharam Singh may have dumped the Bangalore Agenda Task Force (BATF), the first successful public-private venture aimed at tackling urban issues, but the Planning Commission has a different view. It is of the opinion that such an initiative needs to be replicated at the national level.

According to sources, Planning Commission deputy chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia has even had an informal discussion with some of the BATF members. To start with, the idea is to set up a national task force which will oversee implementation of various infrastructure projects and bring transparency among the civic agencies. It is said that the Planning Commission is looking at bringing a national policy to support this. The new task force is expected to be formed in the early part of 2005. Some of the members of BATF are expected to be part of the new task force.

BATF was set up by the SM Krishna government in 1999 for, among other things, improving the public infrastructure and to bring transparency among the civic agencies apart from ensurimg the right to information to the public. Infosys managing director and CEO Nandan Nilekani was the chairman of BATF.

One of the BATF members, who did not want to be named, said that BATF has brought order to the civic agencies. “BATF introduced property tax reforms, and implemented accounting reforms, making Bangalore the first city in the country to have its own balance sheet,” he said.

But after the Assembly elections earlier this year, the coalition government headed by Dharam Singh failed to support BATF and chose to ignore the good work done by it. Around the same time, protests in Bangalore about the pathetic state of infrastructure increased and many companies including Wipro threatened to expand elsewhere in the country.

The commission is looking at bringing transperancy among the various municipal agencies. It also wants a responsible set-up to monitor the infrastructure projects that wil be kickstarted once the forex reserves are used for infrastructure development. It is of the opinion that BATF would be an ideal model for the initiative.