A special council meeting of the Thiruvananthapuram city Corporation on Wednesday witnessed competing claims from the Opposition and ruling fronts on the civic body’s performance regarding waste management.
While the Opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the United Democratic Front (UDF) sought to put the ruling Left Democratic Front (LDF) on the defensive citing adverse observations in the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) report as well by raising various controversies related to the health standing committee, the ruling front attempted to counter the claims with the NITI Ayog’s report, which had cited Thiruvananthapuram’s decentralised waste management approach as a model.
The special council meeting was convened as per the demands of the BJP councillors. BJP councillor M.R. Gopan, who opened the debate, said that the kitchen bins used for waste treatment at source were a failure. He alleged that the bins are overpriced and the Opposition’s earlier questions regarding the project had made the ruling front cut down on the number of bins ordered. He also highlighted the ₹3.35 crore of wasteful expenditure that the CAG had flagged regarding waste management activities in the Corporation from 2016-17 to 2021.
Health Standing Committee Chairperson Gayathri Babu said that applications for a new batch of kitchen bins were received from as many as 81 wards, including ones ruled by the Opposition, belying the opposition’s claims on the bins being ineffective. Mayor Arya Rajendran, in her reply, said that the initial tender for 25,000 kitchen bins was scaled down due to low demand from the public. However, awareness campaigns on the ground had led to a spike in demand, following which an order for 25,000 bins was given.
The Mayor said that the Corporation had spent as much as ₹90 crore for waste management, out of which ₹3.35 crore has been found to be wasteful expenditure. This was a period coinciding with the COVID-19 outbreak, which might have led to some of the issues cited in the report. She said that the CAG had raised objections to even Human Resource Employment and Development Centre (HREDC), the Corporation’s own institution and raised issues regarding spendings through it.
When BJP councillor Karamana Ajith raised the reports of an alleged rift between the Mayor and Ms. Babu, who had taken charge as the health standing committee chairperson recently, the Mayor hit back saying that the opposition would not succeed in its attempts to drive a wedge between the ruling front members, all united by a common vision.
BJP councillor Anilkumar accused the health standing committee chairperson of protecting a CITU leader whose vehicle was seized for dumping waste in a public place. Although Ms. Babu did not make a pointed reply to the allegation, she said that such allegations were raised by misleading some media houses.
