THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The BJP held a protest outside Thiruvananthapuram Corporation demanding that Mayor V.K. Prasanth resign alleging that the civic body’s dengue control activities had been ineffective. Inaugurating it, BJP State President Kummanam Rajasekharan said that the Corporation should open relief camps on a war footing, as hospitals were packed with patients. He said that it was because of the civic body’s failure that the hospitals in the city were full of patients. He said that the basic needs of the people were being neglected in the Corporation, and the Central government should intervene, because the urgency of the situation demanded it.
Kummanam alleged that the Corporation was misusing central funds. “The Corporation should issue a white paper on fund utilisation,” he said. Every ward has been allocated '35,000 of which '25,000 has been dispensed to health inspectors. Mayor V.K. Prasanth had said that the money would not be used to pay health workers, but to repair fogging and spraying machines. However, health wing officials told DC that they were still using it to pay workers cleaning the drains. When asked about this, Mayor V.K. Prasanth had said that it was the health inspectors’ discretion, and workers deployed after 1 pm had to be paid the additional amount. At a press meet on Tuesday, the Mayor said a mobile clinic with 5 doctors and 10 nurses would be launched to deal with the rush in hospitals. He said that everyone should keep their political differences aside, and support the dengue control measures.
