more-in After a feud between the ruling Left Democratic Front and the opposition, the city corporation council on Wednesday arrived at a consensus allowing standing committees to scrutinise the anomalies and replies given by officials in the Local Fund Audit Report for 2015-16. Mayor Thottathil Ravindran, who chaired the session, had to abruptly hold a five-minute parley with party leaders to announce the decision in the council after heated arguments. The audit report had raised 54 objections in the implementation of projects for 2015-16. However, the implementing officers had given replies only to the objections raised against 30 projects. The legal liability of the remaining 24 issues would fall on the civic body officials who had failed to give their responses to the alleged irregularities. Each standing committee would examine the objections and replies to projects, and subsequently, the council would hold another session possibly after a week to take a final decision, Mr. Ravindran said. Usually, the replies are given by the corporation engineer, revenue officer and deputy director of education and other department heads. The council also adopted an agenda on the local fund audit report for 2016-17. All the councillors had been slapped with liabilities of about ?5 lakh each in connection with the setting up of a treatment plant at Njeliyamparamba. Later, the Mayor clarified that the councillors would not be made liable in the implementation of the projects. Earlier, when the council assembled for discussions, Congress leader P.M. Suresh Babu pointed out that the councillors should have been given the audit report so that they could verify its contents while his party colleague P.M. Niyas, quoting the Kerala Municipality (Manner of Inspection and Audit System) Rules, said that the report should be discussed even at the ward level. Mr. Babu suggested that a sub-committee of the councillors and officials should be constituted to study the audit report. Taking part in the deliberations, Janata Dal (United ) member P. Kishenchand wondered why the Mayor kept the audit report in abeyance for more than a year. Congress leader Usha Devi echoed similar views, while BJP member Nambidi Narayanan questioned the replies given by officials to the objections in the audit report.

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