BJP agitates over water, nullah issues

AURANGABAD: Almost all the corporators belonging to the BJP on Thursday staged a sit-in agitation at the civic chief’s office demanding immediate steps to improve water supply system and solution to long-standing issues like Jaibhavaninagar nullah.
Pramod Rathod, BJP group leader in the civic body, said the nullah causes flooding and had claimed one life last year.On Wednesday, too, a boy had fallen into the nullah, but was rescued in time. The issue had been dragging for long.
The minister of state for industry and Aurangabad East MLA Atul Save visited the civic body premises and joined the party corporators in discussion with municipal commissioner Nipun Vinayak.
Vinayak promised that the work on the nullah would be completed within 15 days. The other issues like irregular water supply in areas, including Jaibhavaninagar and N-5 cidco, would be addressed within a couple of days, he added.
Rathod said after the drowning of a man in the Jaibhawaninagar nullah, the civic body had started work to cover it to ensure that no such incident is repeated. However, after some time the administration had abandoned the work. “Yesterday, a boy slipped into the nullah, but the local residents rushed in and rescued him. This is the beginning of the monsoon and anything could happen as the nullah used to overflow and inundate the entire area along it.”
The other issue was water. “There are many areas in the city where residents could not get water for 11 days at a stretch and the civic body hasn’t taken any steps despite represenations. So, we had decided to take the civic chief to task,” Rathod said.
Another meeting of the civic chief and Save has been scheduled on Saturday, where Vinayak would provide details of the work that he has promised.
Other BJP leaders who were part of the agitation included Madhuri Advant, Manisha Munde and Raj Wankhede.