Pics by Daya Kukkaje
Daijiworld Media Network-Mangalore

Mangalore, Oct 7: Passing stern directives to the officials of the Mangalore City Corporation (MCC) after patiently listening to public grievances, Urban Development minister Vinay Kumar Sorake told within the next ten days concerned officials should resolve short- term problems raised by the public, during the public grievance meet held on Tuesday, October 7.

Responding to the memorandum submitted by the MCC to the minister during the public grievance meet, he told government would fill all the vacant and sanctioned posts in the corporation within three months.

“The government has obtained permission to fill sanctioned 2,500 posts across the corporations from finance department and the appointments will be realized step by step”, he assured.

With regard to the appointments of civic workers, he said as many as 1,000 civic workers were required and the process of recruiting the workers were on. “The government has taken task of constructing a vented dam at Tumbe at an estimated cost of Rs 50 crore”. Conceding to the fact that corporation was unable to bear the hefty cost, the government came up to build the dam, he informed.

“Though opposition from the villagers exists because of the submersion of many villages in the dam, we will convince the locals to pave the way to build the dam”, he added.

Speaking on the issue of appointment of the commissioner, he told that MCC encountered grave problems concerning the issue due to which he was withdrawn from the post. Later, the commissioner Ajith Kumar Hegde moved the court and brought the stay order and further, he himself withdrew his petition.

Minister further informed that Hegde was transferred from the audit department as commissioner of MCC and during his small stint allegations of work paralysis in the MCC surfaced. “At present the CM of the Karnataka would appoint the commissioner from the KAS or IAS cadre in short span”, he promised.

During the grievance meet, he heard many complaints submitted by Mangaloreans. For the complaint on failing to act on the orders to demolish illegal building in the city, he told one of the town planning officials to look into the matter. However, Hanumanth Kamath, complainant alleged that 150 building in the city were declared as illegal and the erstwhile commissioner Harish Kumar (currently personal secretary of Sorake) passed the order to clear the encroachment. The present MCC officials were playing a hide and seek game to protect builders’ interest.

The minister told that he was exploring the possibility of including Mangalore into the centre government’s smart city project despite the population of the city falling below 5 lacs, an outlined number to be recognized for smart cities.

He added that the development of markets such as central market Mangalore and markets in Surathkal will be done through public private partnership. He also noted the government has shown interest in expanding underground drainage system across the corporations.

There were as many as 35 complaints raised during the meeting. The minister said that a review meeting on the status of complaints will be held in ten days and concerned authorities should be prepared to explain if any technical and legal problems occur in the way of resolving the problems of public.