Bengaluru citizens seek more greenery, toilets

Citizens have demanded that Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) provide more eco-friendly spaces, better footpaths and increase the number of public toilets in the upcoming budget, revealed the My City My Budget campaign, organised by Janaagraha.
The budget campaign was held from February 23 to March 20, and it received 7,238 responses. According to the campaign report, 3,290 inputs were received for public toilets (46 per cent), 2,188 for footpath improvements (30 per cent) and 1,760 for parks (24 per cent).
The top three wards which provided budget inputs are Shantala Nagar, Ramamurthy Nagar and Sanjay Nagar. South, East, and Bommanahalli were the top three zones to receive budget inputs. Srinivas Alavilli, chief, Civic Participation, Janaagraha, said that budget allocations to ward committees is a brand new chapter in participatory budgeting and it is impressive to see deep and meaningful engagement of citizens to make their wards better.
“Local issues are best resolved locally with empowered ward committees and we hope that BBMP will continue to devolve funds to wards and focus on fixing issues raised in this process,” he said. “This is the sixth campaign. It shows the enthusiasm of Bengalureans when it comes to the future of the city,” said Sapna Karim of Janaagraha.
Under the campaign, responses categorised, analysed and shared with the BBMP as reference for the ward engineers as they begin implementing ward-level budgets. The inputs are also being used while preparing the upcoming BBMP budget, which is scheduled in April first week. Citizens provided inputs online at www.mycitymybudget.in and through a Budget Bus, used by more than a dozen resident welfare associations.