Mayor may not go abroad in poll season

COIMBATORE: It seems the election commission of India’s poll announcement has jinxed the prospect of city Mayor SM Velusamy’s proposed Canadian tour as part of a World Wide Fund (WWF) sponsored event scheduled for the last week of March.
The mayor’s plan to undertake an European tour to London and Stockholm that would have been funded by the corporation coffers, had got cancelled in the first week of March.Apart from being the head of the city affairs as its mayor, Velusamy is also the District Urban Secretary of AIADMK in Coimbatore and is expected to be neck deep in election affairs during the proposed dates of his Canada trip ie from March 27 to 29.
“It is very unlikely that the mayor will be permitted to go to Canada as the poll scene will be at its peak during the last week of March, less than a month away from the polling date. There will be the campaign trips of our leader J Jayalalithaa also. So he is expected to be here only,” said a senior AIADMK councillor.
Both the Eurpoean and Canadian trips were sanctioned in the corporation council during its meeting held on January 30 and February 17 respectively. Corporation sources indicated that the mayor decided to ‘cancel’ his European trip to avoid any political controversy. He was expected to be part of a delegation on a ‘study tour’ across England from February 23 to March 1 and a attend a seminar of Energy generation from waste to be held in London from February 27 to 29. He was then expected to travel to Stockholm in Sweden and then tour the city to understand the essence of urban development in the Swedish capital.
“Since both trips were slated one after the other it was decided to cancel the European tour and just seek permission from the state government for the Canada tour,” said a senior corporation official.
Coimbatore city is one of the forerunners in the Earth Hour City Challenge 2014 which is to be held in Canada at Vancouver from March 27 to March 29. The corporation has already appealed to the city residents to participate in the online poll for clinching the Earth Hour city 2014 title. City Mayor SM Velusamy along with Corporation Commissioner G Latha are expected to attend the event on these dates in Canada. S
M Velusamy was not available for his comments. The resolution initially introduced on February 17 stated that the organisers of the event, World Wide Fund (WWF) would sponsor the mayor alone and the Corporation Commissioner’s expenses would be met from the general fund of the civic body. But this was modified in the form of another resolution introduced in an urgent meeting convened on February 25 stating that WWF would bear the travel expenses of both the Mayor and the Commissioner. SM Velusamy has already been to Brazil, South Africa, Singapore (twice) and Korea on private sponsorship since he assumed charge as the city mayor two years ago.