Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation is most corrupt civic body in Asia: Ex-Congress MP

MUMBAI: Former Congress MP Milind Deora on Thursday dubbed the BMC as Asia’s most corrupt civic body. Deora said that Congress must expose BMC’s mis-governance and bring them to account.
“It’s about time we exposed Asia’s most corrupt civic body and ensured that those responsible for BMC’s mis-governance are brought to account. We owe this to everyday Mumbaikars,” Deora said in a tweet responding to a video created on the BMC's poor nullah safai made when Deora was heading the Mumbai Regional Congress Committee (MRCC).
With an annual budget over Rs 45,000 crore, the BMC is known as the richest civic body in Asia.
Deora, a former union minister, has been attacking the BMC, which is ruled by the Shiv Sena over the last few weeks. Earlier this month, Deora had said the Congress was the biggest casualty of the BMC’s new ward reservations despite being a partner in the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA).
Deora had also said that the party must not play third fiddle and was facing the risk of becoming irrelevant in Mumbai which was its birthplace. Deora supported former Congress Corporator Ravi Raja’s plan to move the court against the BMC’s latest lottery drawn last week for ward reservations for the BMC elections scheduled for September/October.
While the BMC has claimed that it has completed its nullah safai, the BMC last week initiated a vigilance enquiry into desilting works being carried out in the city using imported silt pusher and pontoon excavator machines on Raja’s complaint. Raja had alleged that while companies had bagged contracts to desilt major nullahs in the city and parts of the eastern suburbs using the imported machines, the machines were lying idle and not being used. Instead contractors were still using conventional machines to remove silt while billing the BMC for the use of imported machines.