43 corporators didn't ask even 1 question

Vinod Kumar Menon and Varun Singh ask five of them their reason for keeping mum at ward committee meetingsThese are the men and women whore supposed to better our life in Mumbai Provide us with good roads clean water and cleaner surroundingsHowever all these BMC corporators have done isu00a0 kept quiet Of the 227 corporators 43 did not raise a single query between January 2008 and June 2009 in the Ward Committee meetings of the BMC Thats what the Praja Foundation found through several RTI applications While six of them can be excused as they have been suspended the others have no justification for keeping quiet The notorious corporators include Congresss Rajhans Singh from the L ward BJPs Ujjwala Modak from the KEast ward and E wards Geeta GawliWe spoke to four of these corporators and asked them why they werent doing their jobPNorth wardParts of Malad W MalwaniMajor problems water shortage illegal construction drainage cleaning of septic tank and bad roadsNCP corporator Vidya Chavan said The report is rubbish I have always raised questions The chairman of the meeting always asks me not to raise any more questionsMaladresident Hiten Tejwani grumbles Water shortage is a major concern Everyone in Mumbai is suffering I wont complain about it The roads are always dug up They cause inconvenience But the corporator cannot be blamed because I never interacted with herhim I dont even know who my corporator isEwardParts of Byculla Kalbadevi TardeoMajor problems water shortage unauthorised construction potholes and sewerage problemAkhil Bharatiya Sena corporator Geeta Gawli says I never speak in the meetings because asking questions yields no results I believe in solving them And I have been doing this all this timeByculla resident Agnelo Fernandes grumbles The major concern in the area is lack of cleanliness If the corporator has not asked even a question its something we should worry about KEast wardParts of Andheri E Jogeshwari E and Vile Parle EMajor problems Potholes treefelling unauthorised construction sewerage and water shortageBJP corporator Ujjwala Modak said Being the chairman of the education committee I couldnt visit the ward and hence couldnt ask questionsAndheri resident Mohammed Iqbal Mulla grumbles One of the major problems we face is traffic congestion perennially dugup roads and massive potholes I do not blame the corporator alone Citizens should have civic sense as well But the least the corporator can do for us is to conduct sessions in large corporate houses and housing colonies to educate public about basic civic senseFSouth wardParts of Parel Lalbaug DadarMajor problems water shortage digging of roads no street lightsShiv Sena corporator Parvati Gorivale says I have been raising issues in the ward committee meetings regularly I recently asked a question on water issues as my ward heavily suffers from water shortageParelresident Vijay Mukhi grumbles The access roads to my building are in poor shape We always have a water tanker standing in the building to counter water shortage Nothing is being done to reduce noise in my area I am partly to blame because I havent met my corporatorward officerThe study further reveals that the SenaBJP ruling combine asked 489 questions while Congress corporators posed 298 questions While 124 corporators asked only 1 to 5 questions 16 to 33 questions were asked by 10 corporatorsArun Gawlis party Akhil Bhartiya Sena asked only 1 question of the two corporators it has The Bahujan Samaj Party which has only one corporator in the BMC asked three questions and the Samajwadi party with seven corporators asked 22 questions The MNSs seven corporators asked only 13 questions in the meetingsAt the Weekly MeetingsCorporators are expected u00a0to ask questions about cleanliness naming and renaming of roads and chowks repairing markets roads u00a0school buildings municipal buildings gardens and footpath They are also expected to u00a0give their suggestions at the weekly ward committee meetings The chairman of u00a0the committee then forwardsu00a0 the questions to BMC authoritiesThe studyThe Praja Foundation filed over 100 RTI applications to get data on the ward committee meetingsu00a0Our queries ranged from the questions asked by the councillors types of questions asked and where the funds are been spent said Nitai Mehta managing trustee of the foundation Saharsh David project director of the foundation said it wasnt easy getting the data Our data is completely accurate