MUMBAI, December 2: A Mayor-In-Council (MIC) system, if it involves checks and balances, can serve to strengthen democracy, concluded a recent workshop.With the state government keen on introducing the system in Mumbai and Nagpur, mayors and academicians, while expressing their apprehensions about the system, also demanded greater devolution of power to councillors.

Introduced in Calcutta 10 years ago, the MIC system, while bringing in a more rigorous democracy at the self government level there, also courted controversy. When, for instance, the Mayor used Rs 15 lakh from the employees' provident fund to meet the deficit in a Mayors' Conference without seeking the Council's approval.

Or when a commercial complex was allowed to be built without intimating the Council. At the workshop, complaints came from elected representatives. As Dr A S Rao, BJP councillor in the BMC put it in plain words: Even a budget that is passed by the councillors can be unilaterally cut midway by 20 per cent by the municipal commissioner.

Numerous notices of motion passed by the general body are rejected by the commissioner without having to give any reasons. Only a system like the MIC can give councillors powers to fulfill promises made to their constituencies, he concluded.

``Power should flow from below and not be imposed from the top by officers living in ivory towers,'' said Umashankar Gupta, mayor of Bhopal. What emerged in the discussions was the mutual and deep distrust held by bureaucrats and councillors towards each other. Urging for transparency, Nand Lal Wadhwa, ex-Mayor of Ahmedabad, described how he accompanied his officers for discussions with big business houses on co-operation. ``They (officials) can't deny me this right.

While at the same time, a councillor should learn to say no to many things,'' he added.

He conceded that it would be difficult for a Mayor to keep the departments of employment and transfers with him. ``How do we answer all our workers if they want their sons to be given employment in the corporation?'' he asked.

Ahmedabad is the first municipal corporation in India to be issuing public bonds for collecting funds. While Wadhwa was in power, he had recruited 40 MBAs as assistant managers in the Octroi department. Octroi collection jumped from Rs 150 crore annually to Rs 250 crore, he said. ``Though there was criticism, we stuck to our decision,'' he said.

``Not all bureaucrats are prejudiced, nor are all politicians corrupt.'' Arvind Nerkar, BEST chairperson and Shiv Sena councillor, felt: ``It is said absolute power corrupts absolutely. Power, if it rests either entirely on the commissioner or the Mayor, is corrupting,'' he said.

Dr Marina Pinto of the Mumbai University spelt out the different situation in Calcutta which helped in sustaining the MIC system; preferably, a situation of political stability (read, same party in the state and the local body). ``Calcutta is a unique city, the cultural capital of India and has been under Left Front rule for a long time.

The MIC cannot easily be transplanted on other places. Party alignment is an important factor, as in Calcutta, the Front rules both the state and the Calcutta Municipal Corporation.

Pinto also allayed fears that the commissioner's role is diminished in an MIC system.

Copyright © 1997 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.