Bengaluru: Inspired by the mass citizens' protest that forced the government to drop the steel flyover project in Bengaluru some months ago, several citizens' group have now planned a similar agitation under the umbrella of 'United Bengaluru' to revive and protect the city's lakes.
Speaking at the first interactive session organised by United Bengaluru on Saturday here, Mr N S Mukunda of the Citizens' Action Forum said past experience had shown that the government did not respond to protests by small groups. "But it had to give in when faced by the mass protest over the steel flyover, which was threatening to claim more of the city's tree cover.
So a similar mass movement should be planned to wake up the government to the need to revive our lakes," he insisted.
Blaming official apathy for the Bellandur lake fire, former Chief Secretary, V Balasubramanian warned that if people did not bring pressure on the government to protect the city's water bodies, they could soon find a river catching fire due to pollution.
"To begin with United Bengaluru will provide details of the lakes, their custodians , the constituency in which they are located and the government officials responsible for them. People can then take issues concerning the lakes in their vicinity to these officials and if they fail to take action, can contact United Bengaluru on unitedbengaluru17@gmail.com and we will fight for the cause on their behalf," said Mr Sridhar Pabbisetty, CEO, Namma Bengaluru Foundation.
Members of the core group leading the agitation also include actor and theatre personality, Prakash Belawadi, architect and urban expert, Naresh Narasimhan, Srinivas Alavalli and Tara of Citizens' for Bengaluru, Supreme court advocate, Sajjan Poovayya and members of several NGOs and resident welfare associations.
