GBA cadre review may lead to recruitment of over 700 staff across five corporations

The Greater Bengaluru Authority (GBA) is preparing to recruit at least 700 personnel across the city’s five newly formed municipal corporations for various posts including junior engineers, assistant engineers, planning assistants, supervisors, among other posts. This is part of the Cadre and Manpower (CNM) review, a comprehensive review of cadre strength and staffing requirements following the restructuring of the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP). 

According to officials, the authority has already begun identifying departments and posts where additional manpower is urgently required and is expected to submit a detailed recruitment proposal to the State government in the coming months. “The exercise spans a wide range of posts, across engineering, health, revenue, town planning, administration and solid waste management wings,” the official said. 

“The ongoing exercise involves a cadre review. The review will assess sanctioned strength, identify long-pending vacancies, examine the need for new posts following decentralisation, and redistribution of existing staff across the five corporations. Decisions on fresh recruitment will be taken only after this process is completed and approved,” official said.

Officials point out that even when the BBMP was in place, nearly 600 sanctioned posts had remained vacant for years. “ Now, with the city divided into five corporations, decentralisation has increased the need for staffing at multiple levels. That is why the recruitment requirement has gone up to 700 or even more,” a senior GBA official said. 

GBA Chief Commissioner M. Maheshwar Rao also confirmed the development to The Hindu. 

Officials said the cadre review is aimed at assessing not just vacancies, but whether the sanctioned strength itself is adequate for the responsibilities that the new corporations are expected to handle.  

The GBA is also examining workload imbalances that existed under the earlier BBMP structure, where a shortage of technical and supervisory staff often delayed project execution, affected routine civic services, and increased dependence on contractual appointments.

“Many departments were overstretched, with officials handling multiple portfolios. This review is meant to correct that structural problem,” a West Corporation official said, adding that without a proper review, some corporations, especially the rapidly expanding ones, could remain understaffed while others may have surplus staff.