Bengaluru: For the sixth consecutive year, Bengaluru reported the most number of deaths caused by the negligence of civic bodies among Indian cities.
National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) data for 2024, released this week, showed the city recorded 17 such deaths. Delhi, at four fatalities, was the only other Indian city to report such deaths.
Of the 19 Indian cities in NCRB data, no other city—including Mumbai, Ahmedabad, Chennai, Hyderabad and Kolkata—recorded a single death in this category. But all reported deaths under the separate ‘other negligence’ classification.
Before this, Bengaluru reported 20 deaths in 2023, 22 in 2022, 31 in 2021, 18 in 2020 and 49 in 2019.
The distinction sits uneasily alongside Bengaluru’s identity as India’s information technology and startup hub, its biotechnology capital, and a node in the country’s aerospace industry.
“It means we need more sensitive training for our officers to be more empathetic to these issues. Clearly, the fact that so much is happening and we are coming on top shows that the needle is not moving. We are not taking preventive measures,” V. Ravichandar, urban infrastructure expert, told ThePrint.
He added that without a system of accountability and penalties for those responsible, the situation was unlikely to change.
Officials pointed out that in several cities, deaths of this kind are routinely categorised as accidental rather than attributed to civic agencies, raising the possibility that the national figures are undercounted.
Karnataka Deputy Chief Minister D.K. Shivakumar, who also holds the Bengaluru development portfolio, did not respond to calls. Maheshwara Rao, chief commissioner of the Greater Bengaluru Authority (GBA), could not be reached for comment till Friday evening.
The NCRB data coincides with a run of infrastructure failures that laid bare the city’s civic gaps.
Last October, a 25-year-old woman was crushed to death after her brother swerved to avoid a pothole, lost control of their two-wheeler, and a truck ran over her. The truck driver was arrested and his vehicle seized; civic authorities faced no action.
On 25 April this year, two incidents unfolded in a single day. An eight-foot wall at the state-run Bowring Hospital collapsed, killing seven people. That same evening, a 35-year-old cobbler died of electrocution in Bengaluru South.
The Siddaramaiah-led Karnataka government attributed the hospital wall collapse to soil dumped around the structure during ongoing construction work, ordered a “thorough inspection” of all hospital buildings, and issued notices to hospital authorities.
In May 2025, a 17-year-old student died of electrocution after coming in contact with an exposed wire while parking his bike in Shivajinagar.
Bengaluru also recorded 144 deaths under ‘other negligence’ category, which the NCRB does not define.
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