MNM wants area sabhas and ward committee meetings to be held in urban local bodies

Makkal Needhi Maiam’s district secretaries across Tamil Nadu presented petitions to Collectors on Monday, urging them to hold ‘area sabhas’ and ward committee meetings similar to the gram sabhas in village panchayats. In the letter, MNM office-bearers cited how people had set up residents’ welfare associations in apartments across Chennai to ensure the upkeep of various amenities of urban living. “Residents’ Welfare Associations take decisions as and when they see fit and organise themselves. They transparently maintain their accounts and make it available to their members. Similarly, the urban local bodies, which operate on the public tax payers’ money, should operate better than RWAs,” the petition read. While gram sabhas enable public and elected representatives to interact with each other at least four times in a year, there has been no such initiative in urban local bodies despite 11 years having passed since the enactment of the Tamil Nadu Urban Bodies Act 2010, which prescribes the conduct of area sabhas and ward committee meetings. “This Act only allows area sabhas and ward committee meetings in corporations and municipalities. This should be extended to town panchayats as well. These meetings will give an opportunity for the public to have a say on what — drinking water, roads, waste management, traffic management, protection of waterbodies — they need on priority basis,” the petition said.