Govt accepts KSCCL chairman's resignation

Kakinada: The State government has accepted the resignation of Chairman of Kakinada Smart City Corporation Limited (KSCCL) Alli Raja Babu Yadav. Accepting the resignation tendered by Raja Babu, Special Chief Secretary Y Sri Lakshmi issued GO No 138 on Tuesday, according to which, Raja Babu has submitted his resignation for the post of Chairman, KSCCL.

After the careful examination of the matter, they accepted his resignation for the post of Chairman, KSCCL. The Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director of KSCCL shall take necessary action in the matter accordingly.

The Smart Cities Mission was launched by the Central government on June 25, 2015 for the development of 100 cities as smart cities. Recently, the State government had appointed Chairpersons of Smart Cities - Gannamani Venkateswar Rao for Visakhapatnam, Alli Rajababu for Kakinada and N Padmaja for Tirupati. The board of directors would be representatives of the Central and State governments, urban local bodies, and independent directors, in addition to the CEO.

Functional directors, additional directors may be taken on the board and considered necessary.

The BJP claimed that the party has fought against the appointments of Chairmen to the Smart City Corporation Kakinada, Tirupati and Visakhapatnam. BJP senior leader Duvvuri Subrahmanyam sought information through RTI about the process of appointments. When Subrahmanyam asked the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs about the appointments of Chairpersons to the Smart cities made by the State government, the Ministry stated that the posts should be given to only Divisional Commissioner, Collector, Municipal Commissioner, Chief Executive of the Urban Development Authority as decided by the State government. Subrahmanyam stated that Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs and Mission Smart city Division found fault with the appointments made by the government of Andhra Pradesh with regard to Chairmen posts to Smart City Corporations of Tirupati, Kakinada and Visakhapatnam.

Based on the RTI information from the Central government, Subrahmanyam wrote a letter to the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court also. In these circumstances the chairmen of three smart cities corporations have resigned. And the government accepted them.

BJP State official spokesperson Y Malakondaiah said that it is the victory of the party and the party would not keep silent, if the government takes decisions, violating the norms. He said that the success is due to their efforts which led to their resignations.