Attended conference of Principal Secretaries of Urban Development at India Habitat Centre, Delhi today. The meeting was presided over by Shri Sudhir Krishna, Secretary, Govt of India, Ministry of Urban Development. Later, Secretary GoI Food Processing Department joined the discussions and spoke about the need of modernising abottairs with 50% GoI grants.
The projects sanctioned in JnNURM-I are to be completed by March 2014. On behalf of the states I submitted that after a great deal of effort including assembling land, removing utilities, getting clearances from Railways / Port/ Defence, battling court cases and dealing with agency failures, the projects are now rolling. I pleaded that instead of stopping GoI help and fund flow at this stage, a more sympathetic view may be taken and time may be extended by a year.
In the field of reforms, West Bengal stood at more than 80% achievement and got "A" along with most other states. Only very few states got A+. All states were given time till 31st July to further improve upon their achievements. Incidentally, 10% of Central Grants are now held back (Rs 120 crores for West Bengal) due to non-achievement of all reforms.
I came to know that 5 UIDSSMT projects and 2 UIG projects were sanctioned as new "extended period" JnNURM projects.
At the suggestion of Secretary Sudhir Krishna, I met Mr S.K Lohia, OSD MoUD after the conference to discuss about the posible implementation of a Public Bicycle Scheme in New Town Kolkata
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(Later; 11th July)
Here is a clipping from today's Bartaman (from web):
Dear Sir,
ReplyDeletePublic Bicycle scheme will be good for New Town - can you also consider creating dedicated bicycle paths - safe from cars / traffic.
Thanks,
Sudipta.