Barishal City Corporation (Bengali: বরিশাল সিটি কর্পোরেশন - in short: BCC), is a local governing body that manages all civic services in the Barishal, the city of Bangladesh. The BCC government is elected by popular vote every five years. It is headed by a mayor, who presides over 40 councillors. It’s follows The City Corporation act, 2009 and derives most of its powers from it.
The corporation covers an area of over 58 square kilometers in the Barisal district where over five million people live as permanent residents. The body was known as Barisal Municipality previously, until it obtained the city corporation status by a ministry of local government declaration on 25 July 2002.
History
To provide civil service and facilities to the inhabitants, Barisal Town Committee was formed in 1969 under Act VI of 1868 (B.C.) with the district magistrate as its chairman. J. C. Price was the first chairman of the town committee. It was upgraded to Barisal municipality in 1876 under the Municipal Act of 1876.
It was then managed by a committee, of which the district magistrate was president, and was aided by government with establishment grants.[1] It remained as a municipality for over 130 years though the number of population have been rising with time. Later in 2001, the ministry of local government meeting on declared to turn two divisional headquarters, Barisal and Sylhet to city corporations and passed "Barisal City Corporation Act, 2001". An administrative move was made abolishing the Barisal Municipality as the final step to introduce the administrative body as a city corporation. On 25 July 2002, the municipality was officially upgraded as Barisal City Corporation.[2]
Administration
The city corporation is run by a joint staff of elected public representatives and government officials. Officials both come from departmental recruitment and the administrative cadre service of the country. The area of BCC is divided into 4 thanas: Kotwali, Kawnia, Bandar and Airport. The thanas are subdivided into 30 wards and 225 mahallas. It is administrated by 30 councilors, 9 woman councilors and the mayor elected by the local government election who sits in the office for a five-year tenure.
Annual Budget
Barishal City Corporation (BCC) has announced a budget of ৳442 crore (US$37 million) for 2023-24 fiscal year.
The mayor of Barisal City is head of the Barisal City Corporation. The mayor's office is located in Nagar Bhabon. It has jurisdiction over all thirty wards of the city, administers all city services, public property, most public agencies, and enforces all city and state laws within the city.
Deputy mayors
The deputy mayor (also known as Panel mayor) is a second-ranking official of city corporation. 3 Panel mayors are appointed from the council member to assist the mayor through voting. The 1st panel mayor with the highest number of votes is appointed as deputy mayor or acting mayor. In the absence of the mayor, the deputy mayor controls all functions of the City Corporation. Other 2 Panel mayors also assist mayor and to oversee major offices within the executive branch of the BCC.
a Ahsan Habib Kamal served as acting mayor from when Barisal City Corporation was created until the first city election could be held.
b Awlad Hossain Dilu served as acting mayor while Sarwar was under arrest.
References
^Jack, J. C. (1918). "XIV: Gazetteer"(PDF). Bengal District Gazetteers: Bakarganj. Calcutta: Bengal Secretariat Book Depot. p. 129. Retrieved 23 November 2015.
