Building number scam: UDF to launch indefinite hunger strike

‘The party to bring out a list of illegal buildings within 45 days’

The UDF council party of the Kozhikode Corporation is planning to intensify protest against the alleged move by the civic body to sabotage probe into the building number scam.

Inaugurating the dharna organised by the UDF at the Corporation office on Saturday, District Congress Committee president K. Praveen Kumar said the front would not rest until culprits in the case were brought to book. “The Kozhikode Corporation has become the headquarters of corruption and nepotism in the city. The CPI(M) has been in power in the Corporation for over 40 years, and the party has been looting the public in broad daylight,” he alleged.

He said there was a racket centred at the Corporation, which mostly consisted of members of the CPI(M), and that it had been operating on behalf of the Corporation. “That bribes are demanded even for issuing birth and death certificates, and not just building plans, shows the extent of corruption,” Mr. Praveen Kumar alleged.

He added that the Corporation did not reply to an RTI application on the number of legal battles the civic body had won over the last 10 years, and asserted that the UDF would bring out a list of illegal buildings in the city within 45 days. “The civic body’s lawyers have been cooperating in the High Court with the building mafia to get illegal approvals. The Corporation has incurred huge losses over this,” he said, citing various alleged corrupt deals involving CPI(M) activists.

UDF council party leader K.C. Shobhita said the dharna was just a token protest, and that the front was heading towards an indefinite hunger strike. UDF leaders K. Moideen Koya and S.K. Aboobakker spoke.