In this interview with R Ashok the topic of BMLTA came up and I quote from the article
There is a lot of disillusion about BMLTA and its functioning.. Your take (Gives a blank look, I repeat the question with the full form of BMLTA, his blank look continues) What, any problem in that committee? Ummm ummm aaa mmmm…I think Chief minister and Ananth Kumar’s committee. I try to give him a clue by naming Gaurav Gupta, the IAS Officer who was the former head of BMLTA and KSRTC but he seems clueless. The minister did not appear to know about the BMLTA at all
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The last hope...
...we had of any single responsible authority who can dig us out of the grave has proven to be a failure from the start. Are we destined to put up with the myriad organizations who can so easily pass the buck?
I am not surprised
"I think Chief minister and Ananth Kumar’s committee"
Either he is completely ignorant of what BMLTA is or he thinks it is some brainchild of Ananth Kumar and hence he is least bothered (signs of groupism within the party??).
What ever it is - development suffers!!
Should someone from praja go meet him to explain the importance of BMLTA?
Batting for BMLTA
Should someone from praja go meet him to explain the importance of BMLT
Shouldnt we first be convinced BMLTA works, before we can bat for it?
Possible ways to resume
If you look back, creating a new and separate body which other existing bodies (BBMP, BMTC etc) saw as sitting on top of them (in the value chain) was the mistake.
Perhaps it can all be set right via some of these options
What exactly is or was DULT - Department of urban land transport? What does DULT do - does it still exist, and was it a separate thing from BMLTA?
DULT & BMLTA - How about BMRDA ?
DULT still exists :
" DULT (Directorate of Urban Land Transport) initially covers the jurisdiction of seven Municipal Corporations in the State viz; Bangalore, Mysore, Mangalore, Hubli-Dharwar, Belgam, Gulbarga and Bellary. It will be gradually extended in stages to all towns / cities and urban settlements with a population of over one lakh ".
http://stg1.kar.nic.in/dult/
I dont think merging BMRC & BMTC to form a metropolitan transport authority will improve matters - we may actually see the destruction of BMTC. However bad it may be now, it still is one of the best transport corpns (the best is only as good as this in this country !).
BMRC is also developing capacities for building & will perhaps operate the metro rail later. This is more specialized than bus operations & we need a body that can run it efficiently. BMRC is also planning fresh routes for it's Metro using the CTTS & other inputs.
The idea for BBMP to oversee transport planning - in addition to all it's existing responsibilities may be expecting too much from it, ill-equipped & inefficient as it is in discharging it's current responsibilities as per it's charter.
The answer may be to empower BMRDA - at present, this body is looking after only areas outside BBMP limits - the very same areas that are in dire need of transport links to & from the city.
If BMLTA's function - which is to oversee all transport related matters is transferred to BMRDA, it may just work, though there will still be some overlaps with the BMTC & BMRC, not to mention BBMP.