MUMBAI, November 25: For long Neeta Naik, Sena corporator and education committee chairperson had been harping on the poor performance of the BMC's legal department. But to no avail. Today, when Naik was left high and dry in a witness box at the High Court with not a single legal officer to come to her rescue, the BMC took note.

Additional Municipal Commissioner Ratnakar Gaikwad ordered the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) Chief Law Officer, A H Chheda, to proceed on leave pending an inquiry.

The provocation for this drastic action was a seemingly ``open and shut'' case about the dismissal of a contempt petition filed against Municipal Commissioner Girish Gokhale, Neeta Naik, and an education inspector Shaikh Abdul Bashir, by the teachers of a BMC school at Govandi.

The school was derecognised by a resolution of the education committee on December 12, 1991, following which the grants were stopped. A group of 14 teachers then filed a petition in the high court challenging the derecognition and praying for the appointment of an administrator.

In February 1997, the court appointed an administrator to look after the affairs of the school and also ordered the BMC to resume grants and revoke its resolution.

The grants and recognition was then informally approved by the committee in August this year, but the legal department failed to inform the court about it. The department had also failed to inform the committee that the high court order had to be complied with within a month from the date of the order. When the time-frame allotted to BMC elapsed with no obvious result, the Govandi teachers moved a contempt petition.

For reasons best known to itself the legal department chose to appoint a counsel only for the municipal commissioner and the education officer, leaving a stunned and clueless Naik to argue for herself in the court. As Girish Gokhale is abroad on an official tour, he was represented by Additional Commissioner Ratnakar Gaikwad who conceded to have been surprised by the legal department's attitude. Matters took a turn for the worse in court when Naik who did not know what she was supposed to do, refused to file an affidavit and angered the judge to take a serious view of her statement. ``I had to rush to her and tell her that she should agree to file the affidavit and ask for time,'' revealed additional municipal commissioner Gaikwad.

He added that the law officer had told him that they would just have to file the affidavits and that the matter would be dismissed in no time as the education committee had already approved the proposal after receiving the contempt notice.

``In fact, it was quite embarrassing for me to see Naik stranded as I had called her yesterday evening and assured her that things will be taken care of by the BMC,'' Gaikwad told Express Newsline. Later, in an emotionally charged statement before the BMC general body meeting Naik accused Chheda of acting with vengeance against her. ``Chheda did not tell me that I have to appoint my own counsel. "I realised that I was left in the lurch only when the hearing actually began and Bharucha immediately handed over the affidavits of the commissioner and the inspector to the court. I was told to stand in the witness box and questioned about the matter. But I had no idea what was to be done,'' she said.

Her statement created bedlam in the House as corporators raised slogans against Chheda and rushed towards her ordering her to leave the House.Overcome by this sudden onslaught, the BMC Law officer broke down and left. Several women corporators then tried to manhandle her on her way out but they were eventually restrained.

Copyright © 1997 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.