“N.A” is the key of district panchayat level politics

Gandhinagar, 4 August 2014

After all 26 seats of Lok Sabha and the last Municipal Corporation(Junagadh), is there anything still existing in Gujarat that Congress party may loss? The answer is yes. The BJP is now targeting Congress ruled Gandhinagar district panchayat, due to Congress’s own internal fight.

A signature campaign against existing District Panchayat president and Congress leader Hinaben Patel is already going on. Hinaben has been asked by her party to step down, as her one year term decided by the party at the time of her installation has been over. Due to this reason, the Councillors of ruling Congress have started signature drive, and other efforts for her removal from the top post of district.

It is believed that Congress Councillors who wish to replace Hinaben held a meting. Some of them were later contacted by BJP.

Aprehanding BJP’s move, the state Congress President has also stepped in and personally called Hinaben on phone to direct her to resign.

Though President Hinaben agreed to resign during her telephone talk with Arjun Modhwadia, she has yet not submitted her resignation which is creating boiling situation in district Congress.

The district panchayat elections of Gandhinagar were held four years back. At present only one year is left before the election.

The decision granting power of non-agriculture conversion of land has been assigned to general body in the recent past. Earlier this power was with Karobari committee. The post of district panchayat president is therefore considered lucrative, because generally a common non-agriculture conversion file is cleared for Rs.10 lakh bribe to district panchayat.

There’s buzz that in last general board, 20-25 non agriculture files were cleared for deals worth crores of rupees. Due to election code of conduct, another general board meeting was delayed. The Congress Councillors want someone else to get chance to chair the next general board meeting. However due to non-agriculture(NA) cases, such meetings are considered so ‘lucrative’ that the present district panchayat president doesn’t want to leave the post before that meeting.