Eight months after the Greater Bengaluru Authority (GBA) was formed by dissolving the erstwhile Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP), the five corporations under the GBA are reeling under a shortage of engineers, which is now affecting civic works.

According to the GBA sources, nearly 40% of vacancies in the engineering section are yet to be filled, with a severe shortage of Assistant Engineers (AEs) and Assistant Executive Engineers (AEEs).

In the B-SMILE, the special purpose vehicle responsible for implementing big-ticket projects, the sanctioned strength for AEs is 48, but currently only 11 engineers are handling the work. “Each engineer has projects worth crores of rupees in their hand,” a B-SMILE official said.

Typically, one ward is overseen by three AEs who report to an AEE, who in turn reports to an executive engineer. Every AEE oversees three wards. However, each person is now being assigned multiple roles, adding to the burden on personnel.

Unanswered calls

Sujith Cariappa, a resident of HAL 2nd Stage, said that calls to ward-level engineers often go unanswered because they want to avoid taking on additional work, causing inconvenience to the public in resolving grievances.

“When a single engineer is being asked to do the work of three people at the same time, the officer would not be ready to take on extra work. So, it is understandable when engineers do not respond to grievances, but this has to be addressed at the administrative level through hiring,” Mr. Cariappa said.

In multiple instances, citizens have complained that grievances raised on the Sahaya portal are not being addressed for long periods, and in some cases, complaints are being closed without any action being taken. According to sources in the East Corporation, the reason is the mounting workload on individual engineers. In addition to field responsibilities, engineers are also required to handle internal departmental work, further increasing their burden.

Pranith B., a resident of Koramangala, said that accessing engineers at their offices has also become difficult because most of them are out conducting inspections for civic works, leaving immediate minor issues unattended.

Further, many inspections are being overlooked, and permissions are being granted readily because there is insufficient staff to carry out field verification. For example, different departments apply for road-cutting permissions through the MARCS portal. Ideally, the officer responsible for that particular road must inspect the site and assess the impact before granting permission. The site must then be inspected again after the work to ensure there are no hurdles for commuters. However, the entire process is often being ignored, according to GBA sources, creating difficulties for commuters, especially with the onset of the monsoon.

Work in progress

In Bengaluru, 49% of civic works remain ongoing despite the onset of the monsoon. Many white-topping projects have also slowed down due to the lack of effective monitoring by engineers. For example, the Wind Tunnel Junction underpass was initially scheduled to be completed within 140 days, but after initial delays, the deadline has now been extended to 200 days.

In such a situation, M. Maheshwar Rao, Chief Commissioner of the GBA, has directed corporations to deploy more manpower to expedite works. However, there are barely any staff members without additional responsibilities.

A corporation commissioner, who wished to remain anonymous, said that even they are constrained when it comes to addressing civic issues with limited staff.

“It is unfair to expect existing engineers to work on multiple projects and then hold them accountable if one of the projects does not make progress. Even at our level, it is difficult to blame them for not completing work at times,” he said. “Rarely do we have engineers who are committed to their work and attend to every civic issue. But right now, that is barely happening,” the commissioner admitted.

“Now, we are bringing in more people on a contractual basis, but we cannot expect the same level of efficiency and timely execution of work from such staff,” the Commissioner said.

According to GBA sources, the vacancies can only be filled after the government conducts recruitment examinations and deputes more staff to the authority.