After a gap of over five years, Tamil Nadu’s state capital of Chennai is going to get an elected council to monitor the administration of the city. It’s also after a span of a decade that the people of the city will be going to the polling booths to elect their ward councillors. Although the official website of the Greater Chennai Corporation (GCC) states that the administrative set up of Chennai city includes a council of 200 councillors, headed by a Mayor, that hasn’t been the case in the past five years, that is since October 2016, which was when the term of the last council expired.
During the last five years, the administration of the civic body that governs Chennai city was under a set of officials led by a Commissioner, who is an IAS officer.
In many of the earlier reports by Citizen Matters Chennai, several concerned citizens had voiced their concerns and issues with regard to the absence of an elected council – which according to them was a bridge between the people and the authorities.
Read more: Explained: How GCC administers the city and why we need an elected council
So, with the local body polls scheduled to be conducted on February 19th, it becomes critical to look into the expectations of citizen voters and most importantly, what candidates are promising ahead of the polls.
To discuss the importance and relevance of the polls, how badly the city missed an elected council, whether an elected council will be able to bridge the gap between the residents and the authorities, Citizen Matters, in partnership with Janaagraha Centre for Citizenship and Democracy, is organising a webinar on Tuesday, February 15, 2022, which will be attended by candidates from various political parties as well as Independent candidates, who will be contesting in the upcoming polls. They will be joined in the discussion by members of civic societies and citizen representatives.
Event details:
Event title: Why are the local body polls critical for Chennai?
Date: February 15,2022
Time: 4 pm (The webinar will be followed by a brief Q&A session open to participants.)
Register here: bit.ly/ChennaiCivicPolls2022
Speakers:
- Charu Govindan,coordinator of Chennai-based citizen’s group, Voice of People.
- David Manohar, co-founder and volunteer of Arappor Iyakkam, an anti-corruption NGO
- Meera Ravikumar, Civic activist and candidate from ward 173
- Paul Pradeep, Social activist and MNM candidate for ward 155
- S Bharathi, DMK Candidate for Ward 152
Presented by Srinivas Alavilli, Janaagraha Centre for Citizenship and Democracy
Moderated by Aruna Natarajan, Citizen Matters Chennai