Patiala MC House rejects proposal to widen link roads

The Municipal Corporation’s (MC) General House rejected the proposal to widen 11 link roads in the city to 60 feet during its meeting chaired by Mayor Kundan Gogia today.

Councillors argued that houses and shops lined these stretches, and any road expansion would trigger strong public protests due to demolition of structures.

The House unanimously approved the proposal to allot space for a Vishwakarma Community Hall at Rajmata Mohinder Kaur Park. It also passed the proposal to name the newly constructed Municipal Corporation meeting hall after Guru Tegh Bahadur Sahib. Both proposals were presented in the House by MLA Ajit Pal Singh Kohli, who was present during the proceedings.

A major decision was taken to hand over the city’s door-to-door garbage collection, transportation, and segregation to a private company. The House also cleared the purchase of two Innova vehicles for the Mayor and Commissioner, the re-laying of certain city roads, and the shifting of several MC branches to the Model Town Community Centre.

However, the waste-collection proposal drew strong objections from Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) councillor Anuj Khosla. He argued that the previous outsourcing experiment involving the Hari Bhari company had collapsed.

The Mayor and Commissioner responded that unmanaged garbage was tarnishing the city’s image and a reliable solution had become urgent.