The Hindu 28.01.2015
Renovated Town Hall will not be ready soon
It has been closed for the past four months
Work on the renovation of the Town Hall in Mangaluru isgoing slow. —Photo: H.S. Manjunath
Usually a centre of social activities in the city, the
Town Hall, closed for renovation for the past four months, will not be
ready in the near future.
This came to light at the
meeting of the Mangaluru City Corporation council on Tuesday. Neither
Mayor Mahabala Marla nor Commissioner Hephsiba Rani Korlapati were ready
to commit on when it would be ready.
The hall was expected to be ready in December-end for its golden jubilee celebration.
Leader
of the Opposition in the council Premananda Shetty alleged that its
renovation has been delayed due to a lack of coordination between B.
Ramanath Rai, Minister in-charge of Dakshina Kannada, J.R. Lobo, MLA,
Mangaluru City South, and the Mayor.
He claimed that
as per information with him, the MLA was ensuring that the work would
not completed till the term of Mr. Marla ended (in March) as the MLA had
not been taken into confidence before entrusting the work to Nirmiti
Kendra. As a result the work has come to a halt.
Mr. Marla said: “It will not be over during my tenure as Mayor.”
When
the Commissioner, without elaborating, said that there were “some
technical issues” which would take a fortnight for solving, both the
ruling and the Opposition members objected to taking such a long time.
Chairman of the Standing Committee for Town Planning and Improvement
D.K. Ashok Kumar also opposed it. But the Commissioner stuck to her
reply.
The Mayor said that Nirmiti Kendra, which was
entrusted the civil work to the tune of Rs. 1 crore, refused to take up
the second stage works of interiors and acoustic works stating that it
did not have technical experts to do it.
Mr. Marla
wondered how then the agency has taken up other works costing up to Rs.
20 crore. After a debate over the issue, both the ruling and the
Opposition members pressed that the kendra should not be entrusted with
any more corporation work .
Finally the council
decided to write to the government to de-recognise the agency for which
the council could entrust works up to Rs. 1 crore without inviting bids
and up to Rs. 2 crore with the permission of the government and without
inviting bids.
