Mumbai: Weeks after deputy mayor Sanjay Ghadi from Shiv Sena sought accommodation at a vacant civic bungalow in Byculla citing his long commute from his residence in Dahisar to south Mumbai amid heavy traffic, BMC is making plans to replace his and five other key elected office-bearers’ SUVs with brand new MUVs to offer them “greater comfort”.It is set to propose buying Toyota Innova Crystas for Rs 1.5 crore to replace the Mahindra Scorpio-N SUVs currently used by Ghadi, leader of the House Ganesh Khankar from BJP, leader of the opposition Kishori Pednekar from Shiv Sena (UBT), standing committee chairperson Prabhakar Shinde from BJP, education committee head Rajeshree Shirwadkar from BJP, and improvement committee chief Sandhya Doshi from Shiv Sena. A Toyota Innova Crysta costs Rs 25-35 lakh and a Mahindra Scorpio-N up to Rs 30 lakh.The plan follows the allotment of Toyota Innova Hycross hybrid vehicles, which can cost up to Rs 40 lakh, to mayor Ritu Tawde and additional municipal commissioners.Defending the move, Tawde said some committee chairpersons come from far-off suburbs like Dahisar, Kandivli and Borivli. “There is no separate tender being called for the vehicles. The chairpersons have only asked for another kind of vehicle instead of what has been provided to them.”Pednekar said she had made no demand to have her official vehicle replaced. “I was given a vehicle when I was appointed leader of the opposition earlier this year. The car is new and there’s no need to change it.” Tawde hit back, saying Pednekar had agreed to the replacement but has now changed her stance.Khankar said, “We had placed the demand before BMC for changing the cars at the group leaders’ meeting.”A BMC official claimed that no extra money would be spent on purchasing the cars. “BMC had purchased Scorpios for a five-year period. Some of them were given to committee heads and the rest were given to ward officers. However, some ward officers couldn’t get the new cars and had to go back to using the old cars. The plan is to give the Scorpios to those ward-level officials.”Currently, only BMC chief Ashwini Bhide uses an electric vehicle.
