BJP MLA Shankar Ghosh on Sunday launched a public outreach to interact directly with residents of Siliguri.

A similar initiative started earlier by Trinamool Congress leader and Siliguri mayor Gautam Deb has remained suspended for the past two weeks following his defeat to Ghosh in the Assembly elections.

The two-time Siliguri MLA on Sunday morning held an interaction programme titled Sarasari Shankar (Face-to-face with Shankar) at Bagha Jatin Park, a prominent location in Siliguri, where he directly interacted with residents between 8am
and 10am.

People also communicated their grievances through a WhatsApp number circulated by the organisers.

The BJP MLA said the objective of the programme was to directly understand the problems and inconveniences faced by common residents so that the issues could be raised before the appropriate authoriti for redressal.

“The initiative has been taken to get to know the inconveniences and hindrances faced by common residents directly from them so that these issues can be raised to the appropriate forum and resolved,” Ghosh said during the inaugural outreach on Sunday morning.

Gautam Deb

Ghosh’s initiative comes at a time when ‘Talk to the Mayor’, a similar outreach launched earlier by Gautam Deb, has remained inactive for the last two weeks.

Under the weekly civic interaction initiative, Deb used to conduct hour-long telephonic sessions every Saturday where residents from all 47 wards under the Siliguri Municipal Corporation area directly spoke to him about civic issues in their localities.

However, the programme has stopped after Deb, who contested the Assembly election from Siliguri as a Trinamool Congress candidate, lost to Ghosh.

Deb’s camp could not immediately clarify when the mayor’s show would continue.

Ghosh said he was overwhelmed by the response received on the first day of the outreach and claimed that people had suffered due to corruption and irregularities in the state during 15 years of Trinamool’s rule.

During the interaction session, the MLA reportedly listened to over 150 cases related to encroachment, land disputes, teachers’ recruitment, demands for parity in pay structure and several civic service-related grievances.

Many residents also attended the programme to congratulate and felicitate the MLA.

“The people have suffered poor governance and irregularities across the state for more than 15 years. Keeping this in view, chief minister Suvendu Adhikari has instructed us to establish a ‘people’s government’ that will work for the masses. I am overwhelmed by the response I have received on the first day (of the outreach) and will forward all the issues to the appropriate departments so that the problems can be resolved,”
he said.

Ghosh said a digital platform would soon be launched to enable more residents to connect with him and raise their grievances.