Gujarat government appoints six IAS as regional municipalities’ commissioners

Gujarat government on Friday appointed six IAS officials as the regional commissioners of municipalities.  The government’s move is considered as bringing execution of municipalities under direct control, in place of chief officers or the elected bodies. The government also had appointed an IAS official MS Patel on April 2 as the commissioner of municipalities by creating a special post and now these six posts have been added further in the cadre of officials in government.

The urban development department issued the notification of appointment of six IAS officials for different regions in the state divided in Ahmedabad, Surat, Vadodara, Rajkot, Bhavnagar and Gandhinagar regions. CP Nema has been appointed as regional commissioner for Ahmedabad, Amit Arora has been appointed for Surat region, Amrutesh Aurangabadkar has been appointed for Vadodara, Gaurang Makwana for Rajkot, Tushar Sumera for Bhavnagar and Vishal Gupta has been appointed as regional commissioner for Gandhingar region.

Sources in the government said, “This move has been taken by the chief minister Vijay Rupani after he kept urban development portfolio with him in the new government. The government can directly monitor over the finance of the municipalities and can control the expenditure of grants and source of incomes in these bodies. The municipalities are run by the local elected body and chief officer and that is why it was needed that senior administrative official look after the same.”