Corp's New Approach To Meet Expectations... Vowwww.....
Coimbatore Corporation Commissioner Anshul Mishra sprang a surprise at the Council meeting on Wednesday. In a departure from the system of most of the replies to councillors’ questions being provided outside the Council, the Commissioner spent more than half-an-hour replying to questions asked at last month’s Council meeting. Details on projects ranging from as basic as tar roads to the ambitious zoological park were provided to each of the councillors, in reply to the questions they asked at the previous meeting. The name of the councillor, his or her ward and the question (relating to the works) were first mentioned. Then came the exact status of the works.
After taking down the questions at the previous meeting, the work status was checked with all the officials concerned, even with those of other agencies concerned such as Tamil Nadu Electricity Board or the Department of Highways. Once the Commissioner finished with the replies, Communist Party of India member and Corporation Education Committee Chairman R. Kalyanasundaram observed that this was the first time in his stint as councillor for the last two years that a Corporation Commissioner had painstakingly and convincingly provided replies to queries relating to development works in the wards.
“We want this system to be sustained,” he said. Welcoming the new system, leader of the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam in the Council P. Rajkumar said this was refreshingly different from the one wherein councillors never got answers to all their questions. When he wanted to know whether efforts were being made to have vacancies filled in the Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission wing of the Corporation, the Commissioner said the existing Executive Engineer J. Bhoopathy had been promoted as Superintending Engineer and posted to that position in the wing. Another Executive Engineer would join soon.
The Council rejected the Corporation’s proposal for increasing Profession Tax rates. The tax increase – supposed to be done once in five years – was last done only in 1998. The Finance and Taxation Committee of the Corporation had already noted in its resolution at the November 17, 2008 meeting that increasing this tax would be a huge burden on the people because Property Tax and water charges had already been increased. Since a Government Order directed tax increase, the proposal was being placed before the Council for its decision, a resolution placed its meeting on Wednesday said. The members, however, rejected the proposal and wanted it deferred for a decision later.
