Aloria to empower ward offices

He announced that he would also give powers to various civic committees to pass tenders worth Rs 5 lakh. The powers were withdrawn some years ago after two councillors filed a petition in the Gujarat High Court stating that the powers be taken away.

Later, after the councillors withdrew the petition, the Standing Committee passed a proposal demanding the civic committees be given back the powers.

The then, Municipal Commissioner Vilasini Ramachandran then referred the matter to the state government, to which it did not respond.

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader in the VMC told reporters that Aloria had agreed to give back the powers to the committees and till the the committees was not empowered, the Standing Committee enjoyed all the right to pass tenders.

The decision was welcomed by a majority of the BJP councillors.

According to him, Aloria also stated that he would make the appellate officers of the revenue department to move out in the wards. Sources said plans were also afoot to decentralise the revenue department.

Desai said he objected to the civic chief’s move of suspending the safai workers. “Suspension is no solution,” he said, adding that those shirking work should be made to do the work.

The Commissioner, however, is reported to have said that he would continue taking action against those shirking work.

The committee deferred on the decision to purchase gas meters worth more than Rs 1.50 crore from a city-based company. Some of the BJP councillors had objected to the proposal saying that the meters should not be purchased from the company as a large number of meters supplied by the company earlier turned out to be defective.

The members also did not decide about renting a piece of land to the SSC Board for a period of 30 years. The VMC had taken back the land twice in the past, as the Board could not built a building on time. Now the Board has got a grant of Rs 10 lakh to construct a building and had made a representation.

The Committee, however, passed separate proposals worth more than Rs 24 lakh to purchase cast iron pipes for the water works departments.