Karnataka Assembly
Bengaluru: Residents of private layouts in Karnataka’s cities and towns could soon get relief from poorly maintained roads and drains, with the Legislative Assembly passing amendments that empower local authorities to take over certain private roads and develop them as public roads.
The Karnataka Municipalities (Amendment) Bill, 2026, and the Karnataka Municipal Corporations (Amendment) Bill, 2026, were passed in the Assembly amid strong protests and disruptions by Opposition members. Parliamentary Affairs Minister Krishna Byre Gowda piloted the two Bills.
The amendments seek to address a long-standing problem in private layouts where roads and drainage systems have deteriorated due to lack of maintenance, leaving residents dependent on private developers or landowners for basic infrastructure.
Under the amended provisions, municipal commissioners or other authorised officials can initiate the process of taking over a private road if its poor condition poses a threat to public health or safety. The road can subsequently be declared a public road and brought under the jurisdiction of the local authority.
The legislation also allows owners of sites along a private road to approach the municipal corporation or urban local body seeking its declaration as a public road.
Once a private road is officially declared a public road, the responsibility for its maintenance and development will shift to the concerned local authority. This is expected to benefit residents of several private layouts where roads and drains have remained neglected for years.
However, the amendments have triggered controversy over the compensation provisions.
Under the new framework, the original landowner will not be entitled to financial compensation when a private road is taken over and declared a public road. The landowner will also not be eligible for a Development Rights Certificate or Transferable Development Rights (TDR) in exchange for the land.
The government has argued that the amendments are aimed at ensuring that residents are not deprived of basic civic infrastructure merely because roads in their layouts are privately owned.
The Opposition, however, strongly objected to the provisions, particularly the absence of compensation. BJP members argued that the government cannot acquire private property without providing compensation and alleged that the amendments could violate property rights.
Opposition members also raised concerns over the possibility of the provisions being misused by officials. They feared that authorities could selectively declare roads in private layouts, commercial complexes or technology parks as public roads without adequately protecting the interests of property owners.
The Opposition maintained that while improving roads and drainage in private layouts was necessary, the government should have created a mechanism that balanced public interest with the rights of landowners.
The Bills were passed despite the Opposition’s protests, paving the way for local authorities to intervene in the maintenance of badly damaged private roads in urban and semi-urban areas.
The amendments are expected to have a significant impact in Bengaluru and other rapidly expanding cities, where several private layouts have developed without adequate long-term arrangements for maintaining internal roads and drainage networks.
The new provisions could also trigger further legal and political debate over the balance between public infrastructure requirements and private property rights, particularly because landowners will not receive compensation or TDR when their private roads are brought under the control of local authorities.
This post was last modified on August 21, 2026 12:05 pm