Corporator sees red in civic chief's order

Independent corporator Ujwal Keskar has demanded that municipal commissioner Mahesh Pathak withdraw his order empowering officials of the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) to approve tenders of up to Rs 50 lakh, saying it would render meaningless ward committees of elected representatives.He said the order is contradictory to the spirit of the 74th amendment of the Constitution, which was made to ensure decentralisation of power to local self-government bodies. Keskar pointed out that the general body had passed a resolution authorising ward committees to approve tenders of up to Rs25 lakh. Therefore, Pathak should withdraw his order and instead put a proposal before the standing committee in this regard. He claimed the order was illegal as Pathak could not delegate powers without the consent of the standing committee. Giving details of the order, he said it empowered additional municipal commissioners to approve tenders of Rs10 lakh to Rs50 lakh. Heads of department have been authorised to approve tenders of up to Rs10 lakh. Regional ward officers have been given powers to approve tenders of Rs3 lakh to Rs10 lakh.

Similarly, powers have been delegated up to the level of the junior engineer.