Barely a week after the Trinamool Congress (TMC)-ruled Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) hiked the parking fees in the city, Mayor and senior TMC leader Firhad Hakim was last Friday forced to roll it back at the behest of the party. A close lieutenant of West Bengal Chief Minister and TMC supremo Mamata Banerjee, Firhad is also the minister of urban development and municipal affairs, who is known to have strained ties with the party’s national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee, Mamata’s nephew. The KMC parking fee episode again brought the rift between them to the fore. The KMC started collecting parking fees at a sharply increased rate from April 1 in a move aimed at augmenting its resources. The parking fee for four-wheelers was raised from Rs 10 per hour to Rs 20, Rs 80, Rs 120, and Rs 160 for one, two, three, four and five hours respectively. In the case of bikes, it was increased from Rs 5 per hour to Rs 10, Rs 20, Rs 40, Rs 60 and Rs 80 rupees for similar duration. The parking fees also saw a sharp increase in cases of heavy and cargo vehicles including buses and trucks. The row over this matter flared up on April 7 when TMC state general secretary and spokesman Kunal Ghosh held a press conference to assert that "The parking fees have been hiked without the Chief Minister's nod. Mamata Banerjee does not want to put any burden on common people… The party or the government does not endorse this decision. The Chief Minister has asked the Mayor to withdraw this decision." Kunal Ghosh’s move to openly snub Firhad by trashing his decision through public statements created a stir in TMC circles. Kunal is known to be an Abhishek loyalist. The party’s diktat also raised eyebrows as the KMC is an autonomous civic body. Hours after Kunal’s press conference, Firhad withdrew the parking fee hike, with the KMC issuing a notification to this effect later in the evening even though it was a national holiday on account of being Good Friday. The Mayor did not make any comments and cancelled all his programmes for that day. A TMC leader close to Firhad said, “Firhad was not upset due to the parking fee rollback, but because he was criticised openly by a party leader at the behest of the leadership. If the CM had called him seeking a rollback, he would have done it immediately. But what shocked him was that Kunal aired the party’s diktat for him publicly.” TMC sources said that the row again highlighted the divide within the party leadership between its senior leaders and its youth brigade led by Abhishek, who "convinced" Mamata that Firhad's KMC parking fee move should be rolled back. However, this was not the first time that the TMC supremo made such an intervention to force her leaders or ministers to roll back some of their decisions. In 2021, when the transport department had decided to increase the bus and taxi fares, Mamata shot down the proposal. Incidentally, Firhad was the then transport minister. Last year, education minister Bratya Basu had decided to give green signal to students union elections in colleges and universities across the state, but following Mamata’s intervention he deferred the move to a period post the Panchayat polls slated for coming months. The Opposition parties reacted sharply to the KMC parking fee row. BJP leader Rahul Sinha said, "If this is true, then it must be said that there is a lack of coordination between the party and the government. The Chief Minister is not willing to take any risk in this crisis situation. People are demanding corruption free system, government employees are demanding DA. The Chief Minister is disoriented. That's why if the fee goes up, the party and the Chief Minister will have problems." State Congress president Adhir Chowdhury alleged: “Infighting is increasing in the ruling party, discontent is rising. If the Mayor of Kolkata increases the parking fee, he should show reasons. Can the Mayor increase the fee without informing the party leader! Looting is going on in all municipalities run by the Trinamool. The burden is being imposed more on the people." Hitting out at Mamata and the TMC, CPI(M) leader and ex-KMC Mayor Bikash Ranjan Bhattacharya charged, “Municipality can take any decision legally. Chief Minister or Kunal has no right to speak. Chief Minister does not obey the constitution or law. Government has no right to poke its nose in municipal affairs.”
