Raising the flag of revolt against Kochi Mayor Soumini Jain, three standing committee chairpersons of the Kochi Corporation have approached the local body’s secretary asking for the files of a controversial signage deal which remained inaccessible to them.
Letters submitted
While Shiny Mathew, chairperson of the Town Planning Standing Committee, gave a letter to Kochi Corporation Secretary Haritha V. Kumar asking for the copy of all the files related to the signage deal, P.M. Harris, the chairman of the Works Standing Committee, in his letter, has asked for all files related to the permission for trenching of roads. V.K. Minimol, the chairperson of the Health Standing Committee, who chose not to write to the secretary, demanded that she should be given the files related to the signage deal for studying the matter.
Questioning the intentions of the Mayor in ordering a Vigilance probe into the deal, Ms. Mathew termed the decision as having an unscrupulous intent. She also questioned the delay on the part of the Mayor in placing the recommendations of the sub-committee of the Town Planning Committee before the council.
She also asked the Mayor to be accountable to the council and pointed out that it was not the Mayor but the council that should decide on the recommendations of the sub-committee which considered the complaints about the signage deal.
Mr. Harris said his attempt was to fight the move of some power centres to portray others as corrupt. “If there are any discrepancies in the deal for trenching the roads, the council should take a decision to probe it,” he said.
The revolt is the fallout of the ‘unilateral decision’ of the Kochi Mayor to go for a Vigilance probe in the signage deal, by keeping her fellow civic administrators in the dark about the move. It was earlier reported in these columns that the Mayor had made a surgical strike in the issue, which caught many of her party men and colleagues by surprise.
Congress meet
The timing of submission of letters by the chairpersons is also relevant as the parliamentary party meeting of the Congress has been scheduled to be held on January 12.
A section of the Congress councillors also complained that the Mayor unilaterally took the decision to approach the Vigilance and Anti Corruption Bureau in the signage deal.
