Slump in reservations for Bengaluru’s Town Hall cited as reason for protest ban

Protest

Town Hall had 54 reservations up until February in financial year 2019-20, as opposed to 88 in FY 2018-19.

Soumya Chatterjee

The iconic Puttannachetty Town Hall had only 54 reservations for the financial year 2019-20 ending March 31, as opposed to 88 single-day reservations in FY 2018-19. On Saturday, the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) council passed a resolution to not allow protests to be held outside Puttannachetty Town Hall, with Mayor Goutham Kumar citing the failing revenues of the venue as the reason for the decision. Currently, the cost of booking Town Hall for a single day — from 9 am to 9 pm — is Rs 88,600. Officials said the hall can’t be booked for a shorter duration. After Saturday’s resolution was passed, the police were informed that permission for protests must not be granted at the venue. For long, the Town Hall has been the default venue for protests in Bengaluru, and many protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act and the proposed National Register of Citizens (NRC) have been held in front of Town Hall in the last three months. Officials said that due to the ongoing protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act, there has been a slump of reservations. However, TNM could not access further detailed records to ascertain the correlation of the protests and the slump in reservations. Suresh, Assistant Executive Engineer, MPED (Multipurpose Engineering  Division) Bengaluru told TNM that while there were 88 bookings for financial year 2018-19, the number till February 2019 for financial year 2019-20 is only 58, with only one month to go for the financial year to end.  MPED officials said that this led to the officials from the Finance Department in the BBMP to approach BBMP Commissioner Anil Kumar, who, in turn, suggested to the Mayor to take the step. However this decision was not well received by the opposition and independent activists alike. Senior lawyer BT Venkatesh earlier told TNM that the BBMP does not have a right to restrict protests outside the venue. “Town Hall is a prominent area, and people show up there for protests. The only reason they are doing this is to clamp down on the rights of people,” he said.

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