Residents of Bengaluru's Brookfield Layout have devised a unique public-private partnership arrangement with the Bangalore Electricity Supply Company Limited (Bescom) to ensure better facilities for the neighbourhood. Thanks to the partnership, a service road in the area -- which was dug up by the authorities -- was restored in such a way that should the authorities feel the need to access the cables laid under the road, they would not have to dig up the entire stretch.
"When Bescom dug Brookfield Rd to lay cables, we partnered to restore 1,142 square feet of dug-up road," the residents said in a post on X. "Bescom and residents split works in a 30:70 ratio." The total cost of the project was Rs 5.07 lakh of which Bescom paid Rs Rs 1.5 lakh while the residents paid Rs 3.57 lakh.
Speaking to Moneycontrol, the residents said that the partnership with Bescom was not like the usual public-private partnership arrangement but was more "informal".
Arvind Keerthi, the head of the Brookfield Layout residents' association, told the publication that the idea occurred to them when they wanted to implement infrastructure solutions that would last for a long time. For example, when Brookfield Road was dug up for cable work and was being patched up, the association decided to pool in money and approach Bescom so that the road was restored with better quality materials. Moreover, the road was laid in such a way that if Bescom had to access the cables laid under it, they would not have to dig up the whole stretch.
Explaining how it worked out, Keerthi said he and other members of the association approached Bescom with a proposal to restore the road with details of the expenses. After analysing their proposal, Bescom authorities shared that they had allotted Rs 1.5 lakh for the road repair works. It amounted to about 30 percent of the expenses. The residents pooled in the rest of the money.
"We have around a thousand units here in Brookfield Layout," Keerthi said. "Once the amount was finalised, a message was sent out to all the residents and about a hundred of them contributed to the cause."
Their top contributor, an investor named Siddharth who paid about Rs 50,000 to the cause, told Moneycontrol that he wanted to ensure that the public works being carried out in the locality were top-notch. "The quality of life matters a lot to the thousand-odd families that stay in the neighbourhood," Siddharth said. "A lot of times, one agency would come and dig up the road for their work and soon some other agency would follow. When it came to the Brookefeild Road, the authorities did carry out some road repair works which were just enough but would not have sustained over time. That's when the residents association led by Keerthi approached Bescom and said that the citizens were open to crowd-fund and restore the road with better quality materials so that it would last longer."
He added that apart from the road, the residents have also partnered with Bescom to restore their parking lot.
Moneycontrol has reached out to Bescom for a comment. This article will be updated when they respond.
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