Thiruvananthapuram: LDF is not convinced about Thiruvananthapuram city’s 71st position in Ease of Living index published by Ministry for Housing and Urban Affairs.
For the overall ranking of the state capital to be so bad among 111 cities, it must have something to do with the political biases of the central government, they say. Mayor V.K. Prasanth says, “I am yet to receive a full picture as to how they arrived at the scores which put Thiruvananthapuram at 71. But according to my preliminary understanding, they have not taken into consideration several documents which we had supplied. It may be noted that Thiru-vananathapuram was adj-udged the best city in the country last year, as per Janaagraha survey, and was in the top three this year as well. We can read political motives, in the way they have put the rankings together. Earlier too in other central government surveys, our city has been ranked low.”
BJP in the city hits back saying that the city has a lot to work on. “When the central government offers recognitions to Thiruvananthapuram, they don’t talk about bias. For example, Kudumbashree had received recognitions. The city has a lot to improve on. Someone new to the city would find even getting into a bus confusing. Aerobic bins are not working and there is ambiguity on the number of kitchen bins which are being used,” says V.G. Girkumar.
Corporation officials are quick to point out that the top positions are for cities in BJP ruled states. Among the cities, which are at the first 10 positions, seven are in BJP ruled states.
Coming back to Thiruvananthapuram, under the category of solid waste management Thiruvananthapuram is at 106th position. This is the category in which the state capital has performed the worst, as per the survey. Mayor points out that Thiruvananthapuram has ranked pretty low in Swachh Survekshan, the central government’s waste management survey, because of political biases.
