BBMP to raise crackdown over Covid-19 violations in Bengaluru South Zone

Photo Credits: Deccan Herald

The special officer in the city’s South Zone has passed the move to increase more number of offenders the marshal should catch, who are violating the Covid-19 norms of wearing a mask and social distancing regulations.

The Special Officer for South Zone, Munish Moudgil, issued a notice on October 25 stating, “BBMP marshals have been allotted a target of booking a minimum of twenty offenders in each assembly constituency per day in the South zone.”

The new target is to catch more violators then the per day count of 15 violators, which is obligatory for every marshal as stated by Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP). Every ward in the city is directed under one marshal. The South Zone, already has the reputation of marking the most number of violations. As per the official data taken on October 18, the marshals recorded 14.95 fines per ward.

In an interview with Deccan Herald, Moudgil said, “It is not enough. Violations of the regulations across all wards are rampant. Outside every restaurant and eatery, people are causing an uproar.”

He further added, “Ideally, I would like to increase the target to 100 violators per Marshal per day, which could help bring the scale of violations under control. The objective of increasing the target is not to generate more fines, but to serve as a deterrent to social distancing violations.”

The BBMP data reveals while collections were syncing with the already existing targets for various assembly constituencies, several others are quite behind. For example, the Vijayanagar constituency, has recorded the least violators, with an average of nine per ward.

The notice stated, “the given daily targets in booking the offenders…in spite of repeated instructions” which comes as the marshals failed to achieve the daily targets.

The notice further added, “failure to at least 20 cases per day per marshal will lead to action on South Zone Marshal Supervisor and concerned division supervisors under the Disaster Management Act 2005 for deliberate failure to take action to control Covid-19 without any further notice.”