Mangaluru: In election season, the city wears a clean look, thanks to the Election Commission’s diktat to remove illegal hoardings. On other days, the banners put up for political, religious and other sundry purposes mar the city’s beauty.
The corporation hopes to change that. It has gone into a hyper drive against illegal hoardings. Beginning last Saturday, the drive has removed many illegal banners and hoardings across the city.
But there’s a hitch. No sooner are they removed, new ones spring up in their place making the task difficult for civic authorities. The real problem is, however, faced by revenue officials as there is no penalty levied on those putting up illegal hoardings.
Assistant revenue officer Vijay says: “We conduct such drives once or twice a month. People are immune to this though we regularly appeal to citizens through media since there is no bylaw penalizing such offences. The best thing would be to identify certain areas in the city, mostly junctions, where people put up these hoardings and mar the beauty of the city. Only during the polls, we can book cases against these offenders.”
The main culprits during the rest of the season are political parties, followed by religious groups. “We cannot target both since one is political and the second is a sensitive issue. We are left with no other option but to turn a blind eye till the functions are over and then remove them,” says an insider.
Political clout plays a large role in these illegal banners, buntings and hoardings coming up. A case in point is several officials from key positions were shunted out after they raised their voices or removed these illegal banners.
Mayor Mahabala Marla notes that illegal hoardings apart, there is a cloud of uncertainty over the legal ones too as the city corporation does not have an exact figure of the number of hoardings in the city. “We have called a meeting of advertising / space leasing agencies so this issue can be discussed threadbare and licences can be given which have to be put up on the corner of the hoardings. This will help us know when the licence period expires and thus plug revenue loss,” said the mayor.
Regarding political and religious banners, the mayor was not very forthcoming.
