THANE, Nov. 9 -- In a protest on Friday, several parties came together to demand a separate municipal council for 27 villages which were added to the Kalyan Dombivli Municipal Corporation (KDMC) in 2015 to facilitate urban development in the areas. The protest highlighted that these villages have not been the focus of the KDMC, and lack basic civic facilities like water, sanitation, healthcare, and proper roads. The 27-village belt falls on the eastern side of Dombivli, Kalyan and stretches up to Ulhasnagar, starting from Azde in Dombivli East, and including villages like Katai, Nilje, Bhalgaon, Chinchpada, Asala, Manara and Vasar. According to an All Party Rights Protection Samiti, KDMC is collecting taxes and revenues from these villages but diverting those funds for the development of other areas such as Khadakpada and Kalyan West, while the villages themselves remain neglected. To highlight the large scale corruption in the KDMC, the Nationalist Congress Party (SP) MP from Bhiwandi and president of the Samiti, Suresh Mhatre, led the Friday protest, which also included Murbad BJP MLA Kishan Kathore and other local leaders from the Kalyan-Dombivli region. The demonstration caught the eye of all major political parties in Maharashtra, especially in light of the upcoming municipal elections. The demand for a separate municipal council for these 27 villages is a long-standing issue that residents of these villages have raised several times over the past decades. These villages continue to lack basic civic amenities like proper roads, drinking water, sanitation and waste management infrastructure, and educational facilities. Despite several agitations in the past, the KDMC took no concrete action to address these issues. While addressing the protestors, Mhatre criticized the KDMC and said, "The municipal corporation has failed to develop even the core areas under its jurisdiction and then how can it be expected to develop these villages? The locals have been demanding a separate municipal council for decades, and it is high time they get one which focuses on the development of their area." According to the Samiti, these villages are supplied water from the municipal corporation only once or twice a week, and most villages lack amenities despite the KDMC collecting taxes from residents. Satyawan Mhatre, vice president of the Samiti, told HT, "KDMC collects over Rs.1,100 crore annually from these 27 villages. If distributed equally, it amounts to nearly Rs.40 crore per village. However, when you visit these villages, you will see that not even a fraction of this amount is spent on their development." Mhatre added that these 27 villages included major urban and industrial areas such as units of the Maharashtra Industrial Development Corporation, Runwal Garden, Runwal City, and Lodha Palava, all premium residential hubs, from which the the civic body collects substantial revenues through stamp duty, registration fees, and property taxes. Despite this, he claimed, the corporation has failed to provide basic civic facilities as these areas are "not a focus" for the KDMC. MLA Kishan Kathore told HT that the demand for a separate municipality was "fully justified". "The KDMC has no concrete plans to develop these villages, and residents have been suffering for years. I have already written to the chief minister requesting to remove these villages from the KDMC's jurisdiction and create a new municipal council for these villages," Kathore said....