The Hindu : Karnataka News : FKCCI to hold meet on infrastructure in Bangalore

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Nov 26, 2004

Karnataka

Karnataka

FKCCI to hold meet on infrastructure in Bangalore

By Our Special Correspondent

BANGALORE, NOV. 25. The Federation of Karnataka Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FKCCI) has announced plans to hold a conference involving the State Government and industry associations to recommend ways of resolving the infrastructure crisis faced by Bangalore in particular and the State in general.

The FKCCI president, Manandi N. Suresh, said two recent meetings with Nandi Infrastructure Corridor Enterprise Ltd. and the Karnataka State Highway Improvement Project had thrown up several problems which were causing delays in projects. The Government and the others involved should initiate a serious exercise to ensure that bottlenecks in the way of major infrastructure projects were immediately cleared, he said. The FKCCI expressed concern that infrastructure in Bangalore was likely to prove extremely critical in the immediate future and severely restrict economic growth apart from pushing down the quality of life.

It said that Bangalore, which accounted for most of the State's domestic product and had the attention of the whole world for outsourcing, was likely to face chaos unless immediate steps were taken to tackle the lack of infrastructure. "Infrastructure projects have long gestation and tend to be capital intensive, requiring sound planning and allocation of funds, and they need to be planned years in advance,'' Mr Suresh said.

BMIC project

"We are witnessing a serious lack of vision and statesmanship in regard to infrastructure development. The BMIC (Bangalore Mysore Infrastructure Corridor) project and Bangalore International Airport have fallen victim to controversies, resulting in inexcusable delays. One wonders if they would go the Cogentrix way. The much-touted private sector participation and public-private partnership have come to naught largely due to political bickering and phoney scare-mongering,'' the FKCCI president remarked.

He said that the fact that these projects were essential for economic development was forgotten or pushed to the sidelines by some vested interests. Surprisingly, there was complete lack of appreciation that a project such as the BMIC would not only help decongest Bangalore but push forward industrialisation of less developed areas, reducing the pressure on Bangalore, he said.

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