Siliguri, Jan. 10: All the eight Opposition members of Siliguri Municipal Corporation (SMC) walked out from the civic body?s monthly board meeting today after chairman Dilip Singh prevented them from speaking on the cooking-gas crisis.

?I have acted according to the Business Conduct Rules, 1996,? Singh said. ?Chapter VII, item 33 of the rules says any issue can be taken up for discussion at the board meeting only if it has a bearing on civic affairs. The LPG crisis is not such an issue.?

Singh, however, agreed that the government?s mid-day meal scheme, which has been affected by the LPG crisis, is a civic issue. The members of the Trinamul Congress, Congress and the BJP claimed that they had introduced the LPG topic as a prelude to the mid-day meal issue.

?How can the LPG crisis not be a civic issue when an important government scheme like the mid-day meals is suffering because of it?? asked Opposition leader Krishna Pal. ?We had mentioned the crisis as the gist of what we wanted to ask. We meant to have a detailed discussion on what the SMC is doing to tide over the crisis so that important schemes are not affected.?

?But the leaders never said they wanted to talk on the mid-day meal scheme. And even if they had mentioned it, it could not have been taken up because, according to the rules, a subject disposed off within the last two months cannot be taken up for discussion again without the permission of the chairman,? Singh added.

Mayor Bikash Ghosh said some councillors were taking advantage of the ongoing gas crisis to shrug off their responsibilities. ?They must do all it takes to make the scheme run, just like some schools, which are using firewood to cook food under the mid-day meal scheme,? he said.

Meanwhile, at the mayor-in-council meeting held yesterday, the SMC has decided to raise the wages of labourers, drivers, electricians and teachers. A sum of Rs 90,000 was sanctioned under National Slum Development Project for repairing the huts of 18 below-poverty line families.