By Savikalpa Thapa
The BMC came under fire a day after it started the construction of a 23-storey multi-level robotic parking tower (MRPT) at Hutatma Chowk. Civic activist Kamlakar Shenoy raised serious allegations of financial and procedural irregularities in the project and demanded that immediate legal action be taken against the officials and private firms involved.
The ambitious project, with a budget of ₹504.19 crore, is expected to bring relief from parking congestion in the area by providing space for 194 vehicles. While BMC officials were adamant that all permissions were sought, Shenoy claims that the project is infested with corruption, non-transparency, and breaches of other required norms. Knowing all these concerns raised in the letter, Shenoy in his letter to the BMC Commissioner Thursday noted the further concerns, including financial mismanagement, irregularities in approvals, and manipulation in behavior of tender. According to him, there was no independent study carried out on the feasibility or traffic impact to justify the need for this project.
He also said that the whole tendering process has been identified as focusing purposefully just on favored bidders, and thus, inflated the project cost. Shenoy alleged that compared to other projects of identical dimensions, the BMC has failed to conduct public consultations and violated urban development laws mandating active citizen involvement. Shenoy, while demanding immediate stopping of construction, called for complete public disclosure of all documents related to the project and independent auditing of the tendering process. Falling back on demand for the civic body to register an FIR against the corruption-ridden officials, Shenoy warned that, if corrective action is not taken within a week, he might resort to legal options, resorting to a PIL and also complaints treated as criminal in nature. “It is evident that the municipal commissioner and additional municipal commissioner have sanctioned this project based on misleading information and non-compliance with legal procedures, causing wrongful loss of taxpayers’ money. These actions warrant an immediate investigation,” he stated.
However, the BMC has defended the project, stating that all necessary approvals are with it and will be presented to the activist. Whether Shenoy’s allegations shall lead to legal consequences remains to be seen.