The focus of this trip is same as before: “developmental study”. And the destination is not much different either — the Chandigarh Municipal Corporation has to select two countries out of Singapore, Thailand and Malaysia.

The first group of councillors and officials that travelled to Singapore and Bangkok have not submitted the mandatory report to show how they benefited from the trip. While the officials claim that the report has been prepared and will be tabled in the next House meeting, the councillors are blaming two MC officials for the delay.

The MC is these days busy holding meetings to select the two foreign destinations that the new team would be studying. Many councillors are not happy with the idea of visiting similar destinations for the same study. They feel some other countries should have been selected for the purpose.

To chalk out the plan, the MC has formed a three-member committee comprising Congress councillor Chandermukhi Sharma, BJP councillor Surinder Kumar Jagota and nominated councillor Brigadier Kuldeep Singh Chandpuri (retd).

The committee held a meeting to on Wednesday to discuss the issue and has asked the travel agency to submit its proposal on Friday.

When asked how the new tour is going to be different from the previous one undertaken by the MC just a couple of months ago, a councillor said: “The earlier plan was that all councillors will go for the study tour to the two countries. When the earlier lot has already visited the places, what is wrong with us going there? We will study something different.”

It is these set of councillors who had vociferously opposed the similar tours undertaken earlier. Now that it’s their turn, they prefer silence.

After returning from Singapore and Bangkok, Kamlesh and a few other councillors had alleged that besides sight-seeing and hotel stay the group members did not do anything worthwhile during the trip, a charge vehemently refuted by the fellow travellers.

Nominated councillor M P S Chawla suggested that the new group should ensure meeting elected representatives of the countries they will be visiting, because during their visit the officials at Singapore and Bangkok had just completed the formalities by making some presentations to them.