Corporators hound official for complaining against them

The BBMP Council meeting on Thursday resembled a Kangaroo Court where the Assistant Commissioner of Advertisement Section K Mathai was hounded by the corporators for lodging a complaint with the Bangalore Metropolitan Task Force (BMTF) against the members of the Standing Committee for Appeals, headed by Bapuji Nagar corporator T V Krishna, for forging his (Mathai's) signature.

After making him stand facing the volley of charges, the ruling BJP in the BBMP Council passed a resolution to repatriate the officer to his parent department.

Targeting Mathai, the BJP corporator S Harish said the official had even misled Chief Minister Siddaramaiah by providing false information to him that there are only 844 illegal hoardings in the City, as the Chief Minister was quoted by the newspapers a few days ago. He accused him of issuing new demand notes to the advertisers and letting the advertisements pop-up on the Metrol Rail pillars overlooking the resolution passed by the BBMP Council banning hoardings in the City.

“There are 24,000 hoardings in the City of which 3,000 are legal. Time and again we had provided proof to the Palike administration but to no avail. Book a case of Section 420 and 120 B of the IPC against this officer for misleading the chief minister and the Council,” said Harish.

Later, Mathai was summoned in the House to face a volley of allegations. Responding to the charges made against him, Mathai said he joined only in January this year and the last permission given was in August, 2014 for which he was not responsible. He told the council that he had provided the records created by his predecessors.

The actual reason for making wild accusations came to fore soon after Mathai gave his clarification. Harish said the officer had lodged complaint against T V Krishna for forging his signature. Later, BBMP Commissioner M Lakshminarayana told the Council not to take the police complaint too serious because it is general in nature.

The reply did not satisfy the BJP corporators who passed a resolution to repatriate the officer to his parent department.