Mayor Afzal Imam addresses the board meeting of Patna Municipal Corporation in Patna on Monday. Picture by Nagendra Kumar Singh

The Patna Municipal Corporation (PMC) board on Monday decided to give Rs 16 lakh each to the 72 wards for development activities.

However, PMC commissioner Kuldip Narayan did not attend the meeting chaired by mayor Afzal Imam.

In a related development, the PMC empowered standing committee decided that every ward would be entitled to Rs 4 lakh each for installing LED streetlights.

Agitated over the absence of Narayan in both the meetings, the ward councillors who had taken part in the PMC board meeting, put up a proposal of initiating action against him. The proposal was unanimously passed by the ward councillors, who also decided that the matter should be taken to court if Narayan continues with avoiding board and standing committee meetings.

Asked about his absence, Narayan said the PMC officials brought a proposal three days ago in which they decided not to take part in any meeting chaired by mayor Imam. “The decision was taken in the view of the wrong behaviour of the mayor. Recently, he used slang words against me and some ward councillors outside my office. The PMC officials now want the mayor to publicly apologise for his act and only then we would take part in meetings chaired by him,” said Narayan.

Narayan added that he could not attend the October 16 board meeting because the chief minister was inspecting the ghats that day.

The PMC board witnessed a lot of drama over Narayan’s issue though. Mayor Imam said Narayan was behaving like the leader of opposition: “We were not given attendance register meant for the ward councillors in the October 16 meeting. On Monday also, we have not been provided with the attendance register in both the board and standing committee meetings. All this is a conspiracy of the PMC commissioner. Deputy mayor Rup Narayan Mehta has also called the board meeting on Tuesday which is completely illegal because in the presence of mayor in the city, deputy mayor cannot convene a board meeting but the PMC commissioner has issued a letter to inform about this illegal meeting.”

A three-member committee was also formed in the board meeting to initiate a probe regarding ward councillor Pramila Singh’s case. “The PMC has lodged an FIR against Pramila (councillor of ward No. 3) and her husband alleging that both of them have encroached some areas in their ward. This action was taken by the PMC commissioner, as he was not happy that Pramila took part in the board meeting chaired by me. So he hatched a conspiracy against Pramila and lodged an FIR against her. The three-member committee would look into the allegations levelled against Pramila and if it finds it inappropriate, necessary steps would be taken,” said Imam in the board meeting.

The decision to increase the daily wages of sanitation workers from Rs 192 to Rs 250 was also approved in the meeting. Apart from the mayor, 28 ward councillors took part in the board meeting.