As Shashidhar K drives to work from JP Nagar to the International Tech Park Bangalore (ITPB) every day, he knows that only the Metro can relieve him from the endless gridlocks and cut down travel time. Almost always, the 47-year-old senior IT professional wonders: “Will the Metro arrive before I retire?”The revised master plan 2015 had proposed, besides other things, expansion of the Metro and road development to decongest Bengaluru. None of its proposed projects except the Outer Ring Road (ORR) was implemented. The consequence of those omissions was recorded in the revised master plan of 2031: travel speed in the city slowed down from 18 km/h in 2008 to 11 km/h in 2015.With an already overburdened road network, Bengalureans are waiting anxiously for the completion of ongoing Metro projects which connect residential localities to IT hubs and industrial areas.Like Shashidhar, Bengalureans are not sure if the BMRCL will complete the ongoing and proposed Metro projects (120km) on time. They know of the BMRCL missing at least nine publicly announced deadlines before it could complete the 42-km phase I. The ?14,400-crore project, which was meant to be ready in 2012, was thrown open to public only in June 2017.The corporation is now staring at the responsibility of building a 122-km network which consists of a 72-km phase II, another 19-km of the ORR line (KR Puram-Central Silk Board) and the 29-km link to the Kempegowda International Airport. All these, the corporation says, would be ready in 2021.64789771

INTERDEPARTMENTAL COORDINATIONWhile officials have publicly maintained that they will finish phase II, phase II-A and phase II-B projects in the next three years, the current progress of work shows that the project will miss the target. Chances are that the work could go on till 2024-2025.The 432-page detailed project report of phase II, approved by the central government in 2014, had set a five-year deadline for the project. As per the implementation plan, the BMRCL should have completed at least 60% of the project by now. Ground reality, however, shows a different picture.“One of the main reasons for the slow progress is lack of interdepartmental coordination,” said a BMRCL official, who is in charge of one of the six phase-II stretches. He chose to remain anonymous.For the BMRCL, to ensure that the projects are on time, the transport utility has to depend on several government agencies including the land-acquisition department, Bescom and BWSSB. “Though the Metro project is important for the city, those in power do little to ensure better coordination among different departments. Political will is missing. Files do not move fast. Shifting utilities should take 4-6 months, but we are made to wait for over a year. Sometimes, local representatives stall the project over petty issues,” the official said.64789773

Even though phase II was approved by the Centre in 2014, the monthly newsletter of the BMRCL shows that none of the six stretches of phase II is free from problems. Pending work varies from shifting water supply lines, underground drainage lines, cables, transformers and demolition of buildings, among others.In addition, Namma Metro is also struggling to acquire land from different government agencies such as the forest department, railways, defence and the National Highway Authority of India. Given the 2021-target, the corporation had to acquire all the properties for phase II by 2016, an internal deadline that is yet to be met.“Contracts to take up civil work on Mysuru Road and Kanakapura Road were awarded in 2015 and 2016, respectively. However, we could not provide land and shift utilities on time. Land acquisition is still an issue on the Whitefield and Electronic City stretches. Why should such work take 3-4 years? If Delhi could do it, why not Bengaluru,” another BMRCL official said, indicating lack of support from government agencies.According to multiple sources associated with the project, only the Kanakapura Road and Mysuru Road parts could be completed in 2020. The rest — Byappanahalli to Whitefield, the ORR line, Gottigere to Nagawara, the airport link and RV Road to Bommasandra — could see completion only between 2022 and 2025.For the slow progress of civil work, contractors blame a multilevel bureaucratic setup at the BMRCL. “Between the managing director and assistant executive engineer, there are five different positions. A new position titled executive director has been added recently,” a contractor said. “We rarely have a meeting where both the MD and the field engineers sit together and solve project concerns.”‘CHALLENGING PROJECT’According to BMRCL MD Mahendra Jain, implementation of large-scale projects is challenging. He, however, maintained that the corporation will meet the deadline. “It’s a huge project and can run into different kinds of obstacles, be it legal or objections from pressure groups. It’s not clockwork. Even if one person gets a stay, it affects the entire project. Phase I was delayed too,” he said.The Bescom, he said, could not disconnect the power lines on the Whitefield and Electronic City stretch due to school exams and, later, elections. Holding that the BMRCL is trying to fast-track the work, Jain said interdepartmental issues are being resolved at the high-powered committee headed by the chief secretary.Many cities in India, however, have shown the way in terms of completing the projects on time. Delhi Metro Rail Corporation has built a 288-km Metro network over a 20-year period, which translates to adding 15 km every year. The Metro corporations in Kochi and Lucknow have created a record by completing the projects within four years of starting construction work.64789781

Citizens believe there is an urgent need for Metro expansion as the city is deprived of any other public transport system except the BMTC. “BMRCL should understand the important role it plays in changing the way people of Bengaluru are presently commuting. Before it is too late, there should be a project monitoring committee for each line of phase II, comprising local citizens, elected representatives and officials from different government agencies. The CM should take special interest and fast-track Metro project,” said RK Mishra, founder of Centre for Smart Cities, a nonprofit.As for the BMRCL, it can learn a lesson or two from its own project document. The detailed project report, based on which the transport utility is implementing the project, sums it up more aptly: “For successful implementation of any Metro project, which by its very nature is highly technical and complex, huge in size and to be executed in difficult urban environments, political will and commitment is necessary. Decisions are to be taken fast and the implementing agency must have required work-culture, commitment to targets, safety, quality and cost-consciousness.”