BENGALURU: For the last couple of days, Gopal M, a resident of Basavanagudi, has been trying to contact the ward engineer to get the road in his area repaired. But each time he calls up, the engineer says he is “under quarantine and cannot come out”. Madhu M, a resident of RR Nagar, too faces a similar situation. She wanted to get the BBMP to clear the area of garbage.

“But when I call, I am told that the engineer is under quarantine. It has been a month now. At least, the engineer can depute some junior to attend to the problem,” she said. It is not just citizens, but even the top brass at the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) are scratching their heads to put an end to this menace. They have a hunch that the officials are faking their quarantine status to skip work.

Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike Commissioner N Manjunath Prasad and Mayor M Goutham Kumar now want to go the corporate way and ask officials skipping work to produce medical certificates if they are on medical leave. Not just that, the quarantine status of these officials will also be cross-verified with data from the Covid War Room, official sources said.

“Across the city, civic works have either stalled or going on at a very slow pace. The engineers, who are responsible for these works, claim to be under home quarantine. We can’t do anything about it,” a senior Palike official said. “Some of them may be genuinely under quarantine, but so many others are not, and are using it as an excuse. From now, they will be verified. Already there has been a delay because of the lockdown. No more extra time can be given. No laxity or excuses will be entertained,” he added.