The opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), on Friday, boycotted the general body meeting of Zilla Parishad (ZP) conducted through online mode. While the opposition members accused the ruling side of conducting the meeting online to evade probing questions, the ruling Congress-Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) termed the opposition stand as ‘double-standard’.

 

The opposition BJP members led by Anil Nidhan, Leader of Opposition, came to ZP headquarters wearing black face-mask and black ribbon on the sleeves. They raised slogans outside ZP headquarters, against the ruling Congress-NCP combine. “Had the administration and ruling side sent a proposal to the Government for conducting regular general body meeting, there won’t be any need for holding it online,” Nidhan alleged. He accused the ruling combine of having no answers to the probing questions that the opposition had planned to raise in the meeting. “We will not sign the register of the meeting and urge the Ditrict Collector to declare the meeting as invalid,” he said.

 

Rashmi Barve, ZP President, told mediapersons after the meeting that all the resolutions included in the agenda of the meeting had been passed. She termed the opposition stand as an attempt to ‘project itself as hero’. “The meeting was held after 3 months and the opposition members should have participated in the online meeting actively to raise the issues concerning respective circles. But, BJP harmed the public cause by staying away from meeting,” she said. She added that it was not possible to hold the meeting offline as it would have meant going against the Government guidelines.

 

Manohar Kumbhare, ZP Vice-President and Congress leader, termed the opposition boycot of the meeting as ‘BJP’s double-standard’. “BJP is in power in Nagpur Municipal Corporation, where online meetings are conducted. The same BJP opposes online meeting in ZP. These people have nothing to do with resolving issues concerning public. They should not forget that people are watching,” he said.

 

The chairpersons of Narkhed, Kalmeshwar, and Nagpur Panchayat Samiti, ZP members Yogesh Deshmukh, Sanjay Zade and other members raised various issues concerning their respective circles, in the online meeting. ZP President and other office-bearers listened to the issues raised by members and gave appropriate directions to the officials concerned. Though the members joined online, the audio was not clear on occasions.

 

Tapeshwar Vaidya, Chairman of Agriculture Committee; Bharati Patil, Ujjwala Bodhare, Nemavali Mate, chairpersons of various other committees; Yogesh Kumbhejkar, Chief Executive Officer, and heads of all the departments were present in the meeting at ZP headquarters.