Patna, Sept 04: In an important decision, the Patna High Court today extended the tenure of Mayor and Deputy Mayor of municipal corporations in Bihar from one year to five years. A division bench comprising Chief Justice Ravi S Dhavan and Justice Shashank Kumar Singh passed the order on a PIL filed by Bihar Mayors Council, consisting of Mayors of five municipal corporations existing in the state.
The court directed the state government to make suitable amendments in the Patna Municipal Corporation Act, 1951, extending the tenure of the mayor and his deputy to five years from the existing one year. The judges also directed that the annual elections for the post of Mayor and Deputy Mayor scheduled from September 6 to September 8 this year in the five municipal corporations of Patna, Gaya, Muzaffarpur, Bhagalpur and Darbhanga be cancelled in the light of today's decision.
Petitioner's counsel M P Gupta argued in the court that when the tenure of Lok Sabha, state assembly and municipal corporation itself was five years there was no rationale in electing the Mayor and his deputy for only one year. Due to short duration of the office, the elected heads of the urban local bodies were not able to carry forward the welfare work, he said.
The judges observed that despite the recommendations of Urban Development Minister and the department secretary for extending the tenure of Mayor and his deputy, the Chief Minister kept the file in her locker for a long time.
This clearly shows that the government is not interested in facilitating the local bodies to function properly, they said. Bureau Report