Costly vehicles rust here...

Money down the drain

While newspapers highlighted the poor state of roads in the city repeatedly, the CMC has finally woken up and taken up asphalting. The B M Road crammed with potholes is finally looking better due to the work undertaken by the local body. Similarly the road from N R Circle to Railway Gate and further leading to the new bus stand has already received a new coat of tar.

CMC Commissioner had recently stated that the CMC had made significant improvement in collecting property tax during the present year. However, a few CMC members allege that when asked about development projects such as maintenance of cleanliness and implementing waste management disposal, the CMC says it did not have funds.

However, it was quite surprising to find that vehicles that were bought to dispose the waste collected throughout the city were lying idle.

A few years ago, the local body decided to install metal bins for waste disposal at prominent places in the city. Similarly five vehicles were purchased by CMC a few years ago to transport containers. However, four out of five vehicles were not working. Also, two out of seven tractors have broken down.

 However, when CMC members were quizzed about the issue, they failed to provide any information as to why the vehicles were not working. The vehicles have slowly started to rust as they are exposed to heat, dust and rain.

However, officials claim to have sent a letter to their superiors estimating the cost of repairs. Accordingly, the vehicle repair pegged at ` 70,000 was submitted to the deputy commissioner’s office.

According to officials, deputy commissioner’s office has objected stating that that repair cost is too high. Asked about the unused vehicles, CMC President C R Shankar said that nobody brought the issue to his notice. He assured that measures will be taken to repair the vehicles at the earliest.

Adding to the woes of the city is the shortage of garbage containers. Even though a tender was floated months ago, new garbage containers are yet to arrive in the city.
Shankar said contractors would be pressurised to provide containers failing which fresh tenders would be called.

While city is getting ready for the CMC budget, it is essential that members should highlight the problems being faced by the people.