Friday, January 28, 2011

Zone prez poll: Cong wins 6, BJP 1

Raipur, October 08, 2010

Maintaining its dominance in the RMC, the Congress won six out of eight zone president seats during the election that held at Pt Ravishankar Shukla conference hall on Friday. While, the Opposition BJP managed to grab zone 8 seat. The election for zone 3 was not conducted as its ex-officio president is Speaker Sanjay Shrivastava from BJP.
The zone president poll was supposed to be held within three months of election of new civic body, but it kept on delaying due to Congress-BJP tussle. However when the election was eventually conducted on Friday, the BJP, in spite of knowing that it was combating the lost battle, tried to throw its entire power to win at least two seats so that it could have reins of three zones (including zone 3), but failed.
The noticeable point was absence of three BJP corporators Meenal Choubey (Dr Khoobchand Baghel ward), Pushpa Tiwari (Thakur Pyarelal ward) and zone 5 candidate Anita Yadav (Mahant Laxminarayan Das ward) were absent which is also one of the reasons the BJP contestants got less votes that ultimately cost dear to the Opposition. In the absence of BJP’s zone 5 candidate, Anamika Sahu (Sudhir Mukherjee ward) from Congress got walkover and was elected as the president. Interestingly, Sahu was MiC member who, according to party, had expressed to contest the zone president poll. While the Opposition says that she was fielded because the MiC seat was taken back from her on grounds of non-performance.
The BJP had unopposed victory from zone 8 where Narad Kaushal from Sant Kabirdas ward was elected as president, but it was also eying zone 6 seat where two independent corporators Pardesi Ram Sahu (Chandrashekhar Azad ward) and Fekan Verma (Dr Vipin Bihari Sur ward) were in fray. BJP was supporting Sahu who lost to Verma by one vote. Later Verma formally announced to join Congress.
After election, Sahu alleged that Congress played cheap politics to get the zone 6 seat. “None of the zone 6 wards belongs to Congress and hence its corporators had been asked not to cast their vote for this seat. However, the Congress corporators voted for this zone that apparently indicates that they had taken money against their vote,” charged Sahu in a release.
In zone 1, Congress fielded Anjani Vibhar (Virangana Avanti Bai ward) who defeated the BJP candidate Purushottam Dewangan (Bal Gangadhar Tilak ward).
In zone 2, Neetu Tiwari from Congress (Raman Mandir ward) beat BJP contestant Mamta Agrawal (Indira Gandhi ward). In zone 4, the BJP pitted Mahadev Nayak (Pt Motilal Nehru ward) against Congress candidate Anis Ahmed (Hawaldar Abdul Hameed ward) but the latter won the seat.


Mayor reshuffles MiC, inducts 7 new faces

Departments of 4 existing MiC members changed

Raipur, October 08, 2010

After almost nine months, Mayor Kiranmayi finally reshuffled 14-member Mayor-in-Council (MiC) on Friday by replacing half of the old faces and changing the departments of four existing MiC members. Notably, while constituting the MiC, Nayak had clearly indicated that she would not tolerate non-performing members and would replace them with new faces. She had further said that she would assess the performance of the members anytime after six months. However, on Friday, she clarified that the reshuffle had nothing to do with the performance of the outgoing MiC members. 
The MiC reshuffle was expected about a month ago when president of Public Works department Lakhwant Singh Gill had dramatically resigned and Nayak had expressed her annoyance over the performance of the few who could not even reply over the queries pertaining to their respective departments posed by the Opposition during general body meetings. Recently, the president of Food, Public Health and Sanitation department Govind Mishra tendered his resignation reasoning that in spite of holding key post, he was not able to carry out development works in his own ward. However, Nayak said she has not yet received Mishra’s resignation.
By selecting Pramod Dubey and Gyanesh Sharma in her MiC team, Nayak not only indicated that she could elevate corporators on the basis of their performance but she also tried to reply the critics that she does not have reservations against upper caste. Notably, both Pramod Dubey and Gyanesh Sharma had consistently defended the Mayor and her decisions during general body meetings. Nayak has given General Administration and Legal Affairs department to Pramod Dubey and Food, Public Health and Sanitation department to Gyanesh Sharma.  Similarly, Jasbeer Singh Dhillon has been elevated and would now hold Town Planning and Building Permission department.
Among the new faces, two are independent corporators – Purnprakash Jha and Mrityunjay Dubey who too have supported Congress not only during general body meetings but also when the Opposition BJP attacked the ruling party on raising specific issues. Jha has got Education, Sports and Youth Welfare department while Dubey would be the president of one of the most important departments, i.e. Finance, Accounts and Auditing.
The two other faces are Rani Satish Jain and Jagdish Ahuja. Where Jain will be the president of Women and Child Development department, Ahuja will hold the responsibility of Culture, Tourism, Entertainment and Heritage Protection department.
Among the existing members whose departments have been changed are – Manoj Kandoi who will now look after Revenue department (earlier held Finance, Accounts and Auditing), Amit Das – Poverty Eradication and Social Welfare department (earlier held Revenue department), Anwar Hussein – Public Works department (earlier held General Administration and Legal Affairs department) and Jaggu Singh Thakur – Water Works department (earlier held Town Planning and Building Permission department).
The outgoing MiC members are – Lekhraj Sonkar – Water Works department, Prem Birnani - Poverty Eradication and Social Welfare department, Anamika Sahu - Women and Child Development department, Deenbandhu Singh Thakur - Education, Sports and Youth Welfare department and Afroz Anjum - Culture, Tourism, Entertainment and Heritage Protection department. While, Lakhwant Singh Gill and Govind Mishra had already resigned.

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