With monsoons about to set in the state shortly, a high level meeting was held at Kolkata Municipal Corporation today to discuss the presentations for the forthcoming rainy season.
Amid the political shift in the state, the monsoon meeting usually headed by the mayor was led by the municipal secretary Smita Pandey at the civic body headquarters today. The meeting, which also supposed to include the executive and the corporators had poor turnout of the councillors. According to sources, today’s meeting was particularly emphasising waterlogging prone pockets of north Kolkata. Considering the fact, councillors of birth Kolkata wards were specifically called for the monsoon meeting. However, like yesterday, more than 20 councillors are said to have skipped the crucial meeting on monsoon preparedness.
Apart from the initiatives taken every year to tackle the situation of waterlogging under KMC area, the civic body is said to have instructed to identify pockets with accumulated garbage dump and report it to the civic body headquarters for getting it cleared. Concerned that unchecked garbage accumulation could also block drainage water flow, the municipal corporation has asked its councillors to expedite the removal of waste and garbage in the KMC limits.
Meanwhile, the impasse on someone taking over the charge following former Mayor Firhad Hakim’s resignation, the civic body authorities are yet to announce any decision officially. Till the writing of this report, no official notification on dissolving the board or the appointment of an administrator was announced. However, sources in the civic body informed about speculations hinting over the municipal secretary Smita Pandey taking over the municipal corporation’s charge after the void created following the mayor’s resignation.