Urban News

Community Participation Law, as mandated under Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission (JNNURM), is aimed at ushering in greater municipal functions, representation and accountability through Area Sabha.

Just like a Gram Sabha has statutory powers, an Area Sabha will necessarily be armed with similar kinds of jurisdiction if not more.

Under the JNNURM, urban reforms are prescribed for states implementing various projects in community participation, basic objective being institutionalising citizen participation and introduction of Area Sabha concept.

According to Urban Development Department sources, the objective is to involve citizens in municipal functions like setting priorities, budgeting provisions. The Community Participation Law refers to the appropriate provisions that need to be made at the state-level municipal statutes for the establishment of such a three or four-tier structure.

As per the mandate of JNNURM, a polling station would be constituted as a unit. Basing on elections, the residents under the polling station will either elect or nominate members to the Area Sabha which will have the local corporator in a main position.

“Currently, a corporator holds sway while taking decisions in wards which are the smallest unit in an urban local body. He or she tends to favour areas that may be politically beneficial. However, an Area Sabha will change the scenario with better representation of people’s voice resulting in welfare in general,” said sources.

The Community Participation Law, however, will clearly spell out structure as well as functions. A clear definition of functions, duties and powers and appropriate devolution of funds, functions and functionaries will also be decided by the State Government.

The State Cabinet has already given its nod to the legislation which will soon be tabled in the State Assembly.

The Kowdiar Jawahar Nagar Nehru Park  is one which will be inaugurated on Friday. It will be opened to public with a new look by PWD Minister M Vijayakumar at 5 pm. Pattom Thanu Pillai Park at Kuravankonam also will be inaugurated by Vijayakumar, a bit earlier, at  4 pm. However, the main highlight is the Devarajan Park at Althara, which would be inaugurated by Cultural Minister M A Baby at 5 pm.

According to Corporation officials, the renovation of parks and ponds is a major project undertaken by the Council. During the last five years, around ten parks and a couple of island parks have been renovated by the Town Planning Department and inaugurated. However, there are allegations that many island parks have been included as parks and huge amounts spent on them.

Some of the ponds which were restored also went back to their earlier looks without delay. While in some others, fish fries were deposited for marine cultivation. The fact that many of these ponds where baby fishes were deposited were not even clean ponds, but those filled with African weeds, had raised many eyebrows.

The Sreekanteswaran Park, Sree Chithira Thirunal Park, Kowdiar Park and Poojapura Park are some of the parks that were inaugurated in the last two years. The statue of Devarajan at the island park at Vellayambalam had been in the news for wrong reasons. The statue was covered with posters and left neglected.

‘’It will now have a sound system installed, so that those who come to the park would be able to listen to Devarajan’s songs, which would be played, say for an hour a day. It would remain a token of the cultural ambience of the city,’’ an official said.

On Friday, yet another initiative of the Corporation to be launched is the giving away of four-wheeler vehicles to Kudumbasree groups. The vehicles would be handed over by Labour Minister P K Gurudasan at a function to be held at Central Stadium at 2.30 pm.