The State government has upgraded 56 big village panchayats in various districts. While 42 of them have been upgraded as town panchayats (TPs), 13 have been re-designated as Town Municipal Councils (TMCs) and one has been declared as City Municipal Council (CMC).

Announcing this at a press conference in Bengaluru on Saturday, Urban Development Minister Vinay Kumar Sorake said the village panchayats having a population of more than 15,000 had been declared as town panchayats, while those with a population exceeding 20,000 and 50,000 had been converted into TMCs and CMC respectively. The upgraded panchayats would be removed from the list of other rural local bodies going to polls shortly as they have been converted into urban local bodies, he said.

The upgrading would help these erstwhile village panchayats to get more funds for planned infrastructure development including drains, and drinking water facility, he said. Presently the State has 11 City Corporations, 41 CMCs, 94 TMCs and 68 Taluk Panchayats.

He said Governor Vajubhai Rudabhai Vala had given clearance for the government to go ahead with the process of regularisation of unauthorised constructions on government lands in the urban areas (areas other than Bengaluru). The Revenue Department was in the process of evolving rules for this legislation which would soon be implemented, he noted. Declining to divulge further details, he only said a penalty equivalent of 10 per cent of the guidance value of the property would be collected for regularisation while there would be some concession in this regard for Dalit beneficiaries.

He also made it clear that the government would only collect the applications seeking regularisation of unauthorised constructions in Bengaluru City under the Akrama Sakrama scheme. But it would not process the applications as the matter was before the court.

He said the government was also planning to implement the Haryana model of bringing poura karmikas under a direct contract scheme executed by the Urban Development Department instead of outsourcing them, in a bid to ensure that they get more salaries.