Shinde appoints four Sena members to DPDC

Mumbai: Chief Minister Eknath Shinde appointed six new members to Mumbai city’s District Planning and Development Committee (DPDC) on Thursday. Out of the six appointees, four are from the Shiv Sena: Rajya Sabha MP Milind Deora, legislator Sada Sarvankar, former MLC Manisha Kayande, and Meena Kambli. The remaining two members belong to alliance partners, including one from the BJP.

On Thursday, the state planning department issued an order and appointed six members of the DPDC as ‘special invitees.” The Mumbai city DPDC is headed by guardian minister Deepak Kesarkar.

Last month, CM Shinde appointed party leader Yashwant Jadhav -husband of MLA Yamini Jadhav and party functionary Vijay Lipare on the same committee. A few days back, Shinde appointed his MLAs and leaders on various corporations and commissions under state government like CIDCO, and SC-ST commission to pacify the leaders and MLAs who did not get an opportunity to become ministers in state government.

Mumbai city district’s annual plan for 2024-25 is ₹520 crores. While preparing the budget for the state government, the finance and planning department approves annual plans for every district of the state with allocations of hundreds to thousands of crores. The district planning committee holds the right to approve the schemes or funds for various local developmental and other works like civic infrastructure, providing various facilities to local establishments etc.

Earlier, the government had appointed six members of the DPDC, of which four were from the BJP and others from RPI (Athawale) group and Shiv Sena.

The planning department’s order dated September 19 includes the name of Siddhartha Sonu Gamare, vice president of Mumbai BJP as ‘special invitee’ from the category of residents of Mumbai district and having knowledge of planning, but he passed away on September 11.

When asked about the name of the deceased leader in the list of ‘special invitees’ on the Mumbai district planning committee, the officials said that the proposal of names for the list was sent earlier, and an order was issued on that basis. It also shows political ignorance as the concerned people did not update the information about the death of the person to the planning department.