In a rare instance, Kolhapur villagers vote out directly elected sarpanch for ‘poor performance'
Officials on Friday confirmed that exercising the right to recall and remove a directly elected sarpanch by the villagers of Kasba Beed was a rare instance in the state.
Kasba Beed gram panchayat members were not satisfied with sarpanch Uttam Varute's way of functioning and passed a resolution to move a no-confidence motion against him. In the 2022 election, Varute had won the post of sarpanch by 98 votes. A member of his panel had also successfully contested the poll.
However, 10 members of the opposition panel won at the same time.
"The opposition was angry with the fact that the post of the sarpanch went to the other panel. Despite this, I ensured that every member is consulted while making decisions over funds. The no-trust motion was politically triggered. They had offered me to resign respectfully, but I faced the motion as I did not do anything wrong," said Varute. Varute is a Shiv Sena worker, while the opposition panel is led by Patil, who is a Congress supporter.
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The Maharashtra Village Panchayats (Amendment) Act, 2017, has a provision of a majority (not less than three-fourths of village panchayat members) can bring in such a resolution. The law states that the no-confidence motion can be brought only after the sarpanch completes two years in office.
In accordance with the law, the resolution was passed at a special gram sabha meeting where every resident of the village was eligible to vote.
The voting was held in the presence of an official deployed by the district collector. The no-confidence motion was passed with 1,041 people voting in favour of unseating the sarpanch, while 713 were against the motion.
Satyajit Patil, who was the first directly elected sarpanch of the village, took the lead in moving the no-trust vote against Varute. He said: "Varute would not take into confidence the village panchayat members while utilising govt funds.
This was one of the points of contention." .
Subsequently, a section of the gram panchayat members wrote to the tehsildar about their intention to unseat the sarpanch. The meeting to pass the no-trust motion was introduced before the official. Subsequently, district collector Amol Yedge notified an election to get the motion to vote in the gram sabha. The election was accordingly held on Thursday.
Datta Kakade, president of Sarpanch Parishad Maharashtra, said: "There are only a handful of cases where a directly elected sarpanch was ousted out of office by re-voting. One of the members from the elected members is chosen to become sarpanch for the remaining two-and-a-half years of the tenure. This provision was added to avoid direct election, which requires money and machinery. The process of direct election of sarpanch has more pros than cons.
A directly elected sarpanch represents people's will and does not have to be at the mercy of the local legislator."
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