Councillors, cutting across party affiliations, including the Deputy Mayor, resorted to a sit-in protest inside the council hall of the Erode Corporation on Thursday as the Mayor declared the meeting over within minutes after its beginning.
Mayor Kumar Murugesh, immediately after the beginning of the meeting, declared all resolutions passed and announced that the meeting was over. The Mayor left the hall even as the members including DMK councillors protested against the act.
Annoyed, a total of 34 councillors including Deputy Mayor Babu, 11 members of the DMK, 7 from AIADMK, 6 from Congress, 2 from MDMK, one from DMDK and 7 independents sat inside the hall demanding the Mayor to provide adequate opportunities to all the members of the council to express their views in the meeting.
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Officials tried to pacify the agitators. But the councillors refused to leave the hall and had their lunch inside it. They stayed inside the council hall till late in the evening. Modakurichi MLA R.M. Palanisamy (Congress) met the agitating councillors and expressed his support for their protest.
The protest was withdrawn after officials had given assurance that adequate opportunities would be given to the councillors to express their views.
Earlier, in the morning, the Deputy Mayor, Congress councillors and a group of people staged a demonstration at the Corporation office demanding the civic administration to create adequate basic amenities in all the residential colonies in Ward 7. People said that a majority of the colonies in the ward lacked proper drainage facilities, drinking water supply provisions, street lighting and roads.
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Despite repeated representations, the civic body had not taken any steps to sort out the issues in the ward, the Deputy Mayor said.