Even as the Opposition has slammed the civic administrator and the state government over the decision to give the guardian minister an office in the BMC HQ, and Shiv Sena (UBT) MLA Aaditya Thackeray gave him an ultimatum to vacate it, Mangal Prabhat Lodha took charge of it on Friday.

Lodha said the office will be used during disaster situations for coordination between agencies and citizens. Talking to the media on Friday, Lodha replied to Thackeray, “We don’t run the government from social media or while sitting on the coast. We work with people. Around 15,000 complaints are received through the Janta Darbar and 3,700 of the issues were solved. We need to conduct meetings with BMC officials for various issues and they would visit Mantralaya. Now I will hold meetings in the cabin at the BMC head office. It will save them time.”