Sandeep Naik is the Standing Committee chairman once again

The Times of Navi Mumbai

Friday, May 8, 2009,
He has become the chairman for the third consecutive year, as no other candidate expresses the desire to file their Nomination Papers from Navi Mumbai this year.

Vashi: From the last two years, NMMC’s Standing Committee’s chairman post has been held by Sandeep Naik. This year, he has become the chairman for the third consecutive year. “We won this post unopposed, as no other corporator filed his nominations papers for this post on Thursday, at the NMMC headquarters. So no voting was required.” Said NMMC secretary Chandrakant Devkar. Naik will be declared chairman of the standing committee 2009-10 led by the divisional commissioner of Konkan Bhavan on Friday at the standing Committee hallThis decision has turned many heads in the Nationalist Congress party (NCP), as no other corporator has been given the chance to head important civic committees, other than Sandeep Naik by the party officials. This being the last year for the current corporators, there were many waiting in the queue for this post. However, no corporator from NCP expressed their wish to file their nomination for this post, as Naik expressed his interest. Although names of some of the committee members, like Anant Sutar, were in the air, the party leaders showed their confidence in Naik, who is expected to lead NCP in the civic elections next year.
“We were not even consulted when the decision regarding the chairman was taken. But we knew it will be him. We can only hope that Naik will make good decisions and will win the confidence of the common man, as we all will have to stand for elections within a year. Whatever decision is taken by this Standing Committee will eventually affect the Voter’s decision,” said one of the senior members, on condition of anonymity.

Meanwhile, the name for wards, president has also been filed. Out of sic wards, only one ward has been given to congress party; the remaining five are with NCP.