By Our Staff Reporter
Dehradun, 3 Nov: Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami today held a review meeting of the works being done under the Smart City project. It may be recalled that the Dehradun Mayor and others including the Opposition have a number of times expressed serious reservations about the quality and pace of the works being done under the Smart City Project.
Chairing the review meeting, the CM said that in whatever works being done under the project, special attention should be paid to what could be done best. All the work should be completed within the prescribed time limit while ensuring there is no compromise in the quality of works. He also stressed that the suggestions given by the people’s representatives be implemented seriously. He also directed that the roads coming under the Smart City Project be made pothole free.
Dhami directed the smart city officials to work in the perspective of the coming 50 years. Officers of all the executing agencies needed to ensure that the quality of work is not compromised. He warned them of strict action if any deficiency is found in the quality of work.
He also directed the Garhwal Commissioner to regularly review the works. He gave instructions to the officers that the works be completed expeditiously keeping in view public inconvenience being caused. It needs to be ensured that public money is used in public interest with proper planning. For this, all the departments and working organisations are required to work in coordination with each other.
Dhami said that a complete action plan should be prepared keeping in mind what else could be done to make Dehradun an ideal city. He asked for an awareness campaign to be conducted for a Green City, Clean City. Special attention had also to be paid to the cleanliness and sanitation of the city. He directed the officers to pay serious attention to the suggestions given by the public representatives and to consider and implement appropriate solutions based on them.
Dhami said that a greater focus is required on strengthening the municipalities. Schemes, in which the share of the Centre and the state are in the ratio of 90 and 10, respectively, need to be taken up on top priority basis. The Chief Minister directed the officers to ensure that all roads are made pothole free at the earliest. The work of strengthening on roads more than 3.75 metres wide in municipal areas should be done by the Public Works Department. He said that there is also a need to strengthen the municipal bodies from the point of view of human resources.
The Chief Minister asked for necessary proposals on the required budget to be submitted to the government at the earliest. The Chief Minister directed the Chief Secretary to hold a separate meeting to review the various works being done at the Parade Ground under the Smart City project.
CEO Smart City / District Magistrate, Dehradun, Sonika provided detailed information about the progress on various works going on under project. She said that a target had been set to complete this Dehradun Smart City project by June 2023. Out of the 26 projects that are to be worked on under the Smart City project, 10 had been completed, while most of the work on 4 other projects has been completed. Work on 12 remaining projects is still in progress.
Present on this occasion were Urban Development Minister Prem Chand Agrawal, Mayor Sunil Uniyal Gama, MLAs Vinod Chamoli, Khajan Das, Umesh Sharma Kau, Savita Kapoor, Chief Secretary Dr SS Sandhu, Additional Chief Secretary Radha Raturi, Additional Chief Secretary Anand Vardhan, Principal Secretary RK Sudhanshu, Garhwal Commissioner Sushil Kumar and Additional Secretary Udayraj Singh.
