Bengaluru steel flyover project put on hold: Civic body tells Karnataka HC

Bengaluru: The Bangalore Development Authority (BDA) on Thursday gave an undertaking to the Karnataka high court that it would not proceed with the construction of the ₹ 1,791-crore steel flyover that had turned controversial.

Touted to be the longest in the country, the proposed project consists of building a six-lane elevated road from Basaveshwara Circle to Hebbal flyover using steel. But opposition against the project has been mounting, with civic groups and environmentalists raising concerns over felling of at least 800 full-grown trees, demolition of heritage buildings coupled with ‘vested interests’—all for a project that they say is unlikely to de-congest one of the busiest roads in the city.

While about 8,000 citizens in Bengaluru came out and formed a symbolic human chain under sweltering heat recently in protest against the flyover, the National Green Tribunal slapped the project with in an interim injunction on 28 October where it asked the state to file a report on its environmental impact before starting any construction.

The case came up in the high court following a petition filed by Namma Bengaluru Foundation (NBF), a civic group.

According to a statement from the NBF, the high court on Thursday said that it would examine the legal and constitutional issues, such as lack of public consultation and scrutiny of the project by the nodal authority of planning the city called Metropolitan Planning Committee, and then pass a final order.

BDA commissioner Raj Kumar Khatri did not answer a phone call from Mint.