Most agenda items get House nod

Shivani Bhakoo

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Tribune News Service

Ludhiana, December 20

General House meeting of the Municipal Corporation, which was held after a gap of about six months, witnessed a thin attendance of councillors today. As expected, not much objection was raised while approving most agenda items.

The proceedings of the House were carried out under the chairmanship of Mayor Harcharan Singh Gohalwaria and Surbhi Malik, Additional Commissioner (officiating Commissioner).

Most of the Congress and independent councillors looked “calm” today when proceedings of the House were going on. One of the BJP councillors said in low voice: “It is a friendly match”.

The House was stalled for almost 40-45 minutes as most of the councillors raised objections to the use of substandard material by the contractors in constructing roads, and no check by the field staff on “hap-hazard” development works.

The Congress councillor from Ward Number 49, Mamta Ashu, made sure that officials of the Zone D office cut a sorry figure in the House when she highlighted how they had “misled” the state government and the department as far as development works in her ward were concerned.

She told the House that the pre-mix plant in the area was shut but the roads were being recarpeted during the night hours, which was not advisable at all. She said no field staff was there to ensure use of quality material. Other councillors, including Jai Prakash and Balkar Singh Sandhu, also came in support of Ashu. They lambasted the officials for adopting a negligent approach.

A few councillors raised the issue that XEN of Zone-D DS Bhullar had used “unparliamentary” language for which he should feel sorry. Bhullar had to apologise after the Mayor, too, asked him to take his words back or else departmental action would be taken against him.

Besides, Gohalwaria asked Surbhi Malik to take action against erring officials. He also instructed her to blacklist contractors found using substandard material in the construction of roads.

On the issue of expanding the MC limits, PS Soma, independent councillor, asked the Mayor not to approve the agenda item for gaining “political mileage”. However, the item was approved on the pretext that the state government had already sent a notification about extending the limits in other districts as well.