Mangaluru (The Hindu): Bharatiya Janata Party councillors in the Mangaluru City Corporation (MCC) on Tuesday staged a demonstration outside the corporation office protesting against the slow pace of development works and bad financial health of the civic body.

The members said that ever since the Congress took over the reigns of the civic body, development works had derailed. While every councillor was entitled to undertake works worth Rs. 30 lakh in his or her ward, the officials were limiting the proposals to Rs. 15 lakh, which was illegal, Leader of the Opposition Sudhir Shetty said.

At the same time, the Town Planning and Development Standing Committee had been taking unilateral decisions at the instance of two MLAs of Mangaluru in taking up projects under the 14th Finance Commission of the Union government and the State government grants. The administration, though had taken proposals from every councillor, they were not taken into consideration while formulating the plans, Mr. Shetty alleged.

The imbroglio with garbage disposal had caught the attention of the nation, Mr. Shetty said and alleged that this had been mainly due to financial indiscipline and bad management. While the administration had been paying the contractor who had been lifting the garbage, contractors who had executed other projects had not been paid for months together, he said.

In a memorandum submitted to the MCC Commissioner, BJP urged the administration to set right the problems.

Photo credit: The Hindu