Thiruvananthapuram Corporation has passed a resolution presented by LDF’s K Sreekumar against the proposed privatisation of airport. It was one of the six airports of Airport Authority of India (AAI) which was given an in-principle union cabinet approval for privatisation in November.
The operation, management and development will be leased out under Public Private Partnersh-ip (PPP) through Public Private Appraisal Committee (PPAC). The state government has requested the centre to try out the CIAL model. They would rather have a public-private partnership company with state having a major stake, just like CIAL.
Thiruvananthapuram airport was bringing in a lot of profit and there was no need for privatisation, said Sreekumar. He said that even as Airport Aut-hority of India would reassign around 500 employees it has employed, the move is going to affect the jobs of 1000 other people who have been working as contract employees.
BJP demanded that the resolution should be passed only after an all-party meeting. BJP councillors Nemom Gopan and V.G. Girikumar said that it was a resolution which was not included in the agenda. They, despite a Press Information Bureau release suggesting otherwise, said that there is no official government order regarding the privatisation of airports and so the privatisation is not happening.
Mayor V.K. Prasanth rul-ed against their demand that the resolution can be presented in the next council.
The resolution passed with LDF votes, as UDF had boycotted the meeting in the beginning, after Mayor V.K. Prasanth denied permission to present a resolution related to Sabarimala. This was the meeting where UDF’s K. Seelas was sworn in, but he could hardly spend any time in his first council meeting.
BJP had raised an issue regarding inefficiency of the engineering wing, but Works Standing Commit-tee chairperson S Pushpa-latha said that this was not true.
Resolutions connected with the renaming of three roads were presented. Following Palayam councillor Aisha Backer’s resolution, Nandavanam Sreebodheswaran Road was renamed as K Siva-dasan Pillai Road. After Thampanoor councillor M Jayalakshmi’s resolution, the road between Gandha-ri Amman temple and Ind-ia Hospital was renamed as APJ Abdul Kalam Road, while the road between India Hospital and Sreem-oolam Road was renamed EMS Namboothiripad Road.
