After a strong opposition from ward councillors under Ranchi Municipal Corporation (RMC), Dhanbad Municipal Corporation (DMC) and other civic bodies in the State, Urban Development Department Minister CP Singh said on Thursday that the recent notification barring anyone having more than two kids post December 2017 from fighting civic body elections will be rectified properly.
Calling the prevailing confusion and unrest among existing elected councillors of civic bodies a result of misappropriate selection of words in a notification by concerned officials in the department, the Minister said that those already having more kids will be exempted under soon-to-be released notification, which is aimed at encouraging smaller families.
“The entire mess was created due to wrong selection of words in a notification which was destined to be misunderstood and misinterpreted. Everyone knows that no law can be brought into existence with retrospective effect. So, I will ask councillors having more than two kids at present to remain relaxed, as they will be kept out of the new norms,” said Singh.
Notably, the Urban Development Department had come up with a notification a week back which barred anyone having more than two kids on December 31 this year to contest any of the civic body elections in the State after the date. The notification was an extension of a similar notification in 2011 which was somehow never followed, nor was ever tried to be enforced.
“We know that the matter has some technical issues like twins too. I am a father of twins, and I know that no one can help if second child happens to be a twin. Moreover, we will have to keep a window of at least nine to 10 months open in notification for a kid who might exist in foetus on the day the fresh notification is being gazetted,” said Singh.
However, Dhanbad Municipal Corporation Mayor Chandrashekhar Agrawal called any such barrier for ward councillors only a nasty move of the department which could destroy meaning of three-tier power system (civic bodies). “Such a move must come from the first tier of the elected representatives. But they wouldn’t do so, as they are busy in getting rural and semi urban developed by second line of power centres (the bureaucrats and government officials) which succeeded in nowhere in the world. They have already occupied majority of our rights and now trying to destroy civic bodies,” said Agrawal.
Ranchi Municipal Corporation Deputy Mayor Sanjeev Vijayvargeeya too appeared highly upset with the notification. “The whole idea is rubbish. At one end, they cry of unavailability of good people at ground level politics. On the other hand, they call someone misfit for politics only because he or she has more than two kids. We will not let it happen,” said Vijayvargeeya.