The City Corporation Council’s meeting on Tuesday ended soon after it began, following vociferous protests from the Opposition benches over a delay in sending them the day’s agenda.
As soon as Mayor K. Chandrika began reading out a condolence resolution in honour of Communist leader Rosamma Punnoose, the Opposition United Democratic Front (UDF) and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) members rushed to the well, shouting slogans.
The Mayor soon declared the end of the meeting after the items on the agenda were quickly rattled off, with the ruling party councillors giving assent to it all.
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Opposition councillors said the agenda should be provided to them ‘three working days prior to the council meeting.’
This would give them enough time to study the items and participate in the meeting actively, they added. “Copies of the agenda for today’s meeting were supplied to us on December 28. The next day being a holiday (Sunday), we effectively got only two working days to study the agenda. This is a clear violation of the Municipal Act,” BJP councillor M.R. Rajeev said.
The ruling party councillors said all of them effectively got three days to study the agenda and that this was merely a ‘technical pretext’ to disrupt the meeting.
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The Opposition had reportedly asked the Corporation Secretary to declare the meeting on Tuesday as invalid.