Paving the way to a better administration?

Paving the way to a better administration?
Deccan herald

As Commissioner K Jairaj holds out the promise of some “quick decisions” during the administrator’s rule, Deccan Herald spoke to former mayors and commissioners to check out if work does proceed faster under an administrator.

As Commissioner K Jairaj holds out the promise of some “quick decisions” during the administrator’s rule, Deccan Herald spoke to former mayors and commissioners to check out if work does proceed faster under an administrator.

While all of them said that the role of an elected body is the only valid proposition under a democratic set-up, they also vowed that the stature of the administrator marks the development under his tenure.

“There cannot be a man of integrity and visionary like Lakshman Rau,” says former Mayor V S Krishna Iyer. With the highest term of seven years, Rau was the architect of new Bangalore, and developed all the 10 residential blocks of Jayanagar. Iyer adds that the degradation in party politics, is seen in Parliament and Assembly and it does not pertain to the BMP alone.


Eighty-four-year-old G Narayan who served as the mayor of Bangalore from 1957 to 1964 says it would be a good idea to appoint a committee of experienced administrators under the BMP administrator to help run the show of a City that has grown by leaps and bounds. He adds that public complaints of the corporators delaying work and not working in tandem with officials only reflects the mediocrity that has set into most democratic set-ups.

Former BMP commissioner K P Pandey feels that if a rule of law made for a country or democratic system (like election of a civic body) does not suit its development, “the law should be changed.”

Former mayor P R Ramesh reminscenses that H D Deve Gowda like his son H D Kumaraswamy had delayed BMP elections for 18 months which led to the appointment of Dr A Ravindra as the administrator before the 1995 BMP elections.