Decentralize now and save the city

Decentralize now and save the city
Vijay Times

Actor turned Environmentalist Suresh Heblikar , who is the Secretary of the Bharath Scouts and Guides (Karnataka Circle) is a person who loves this City . The man, who is also the founder-c convenor of Eco W atch, a centre for enviro and sustainable development, spoke on problems that he thought were of utmost importance. Not stopping with just discussing problems, the environmentalist also spoke on how these problems could be solved. The passion with which he discussed the issues made it obvious that his words were straight from the heart.

T oday , the poor here have helped the wealthy to grow richer and richer . Consider the hue and cry raised by IT - BT industries. The previous governments did so much just to appease the heads of a few IT companies.

Again, when there was a change in governmen we heard them crib about the lack of infrastructur And our administrators did everything possibl keep them happy .

But as a government, let them ask themselve they have exclusive ’poor friendly’ tasks on agenda . If so, how many such tasks were executed and how many stood to benefit from such tasks? The way innumerable apartments are cropping up everywhere drives you mad. Who are they? Not the poor at all. Not even the commoner . Wh the government been doing in these ten year allowing all this to happen under its nose ? Because of these structures, our lakes hav appeared thus devastating the water bodies. Percolation of water has stopped in these a The number of slums have gone up.

The vehicles in the City cause about 25 per cent of air pollution.

Even in the case of Metro , things are not ent. The survey speaks of the track passing throug Lalbagh.

Listen ! Queen Elizabeth had described it a miniature Holland in Bangalore, when she vis the place decades ago.

It looks like the Metro will be crushing d thousands of homes of the poor . I’m told comes before my house too that is situated cool bylanes of Jayanagar amidst the lush g locales of Lakshman Rao park. If it tantamounts to eliminating these parks and trees, then I will not keep quiet.

Look, we should have got the Metro 15 years ago when the City had not developed so much. T what we need is committed bus routes where frequency of the buses is one in two minutes. Smal buses, unlike the lengthy , tall buses sho operated on routes that pass through the Ci interiors. W e should know what we want . W e cannot go on squandering public funds by tryin adopt what other countries have.

W e, at Eco-W atch, have successfully planted 44,000 trees on the Airport Road. On Sarjapur Road we have planted 6,000 trees. Through an I Norwegian Environment programme (INEP), EcoW atch is enhancing good lung space in the City Now , the only mantra that can rescue Bangalore is decentralisation. W e need to stop the migrati of the rural youth to the Cities as the C the carrying capacity to sustain any further growt