Urban Regeneration with British Inputs

I met a delegation of UK India at Minister Firhad Hakim's chamber. We talked of urban regeneration and new towns, new technology and riverfront development. There will be a UK funded 3 month 'scoping study'. Here in an article in today's Bartaman:

Here is another link to Times of India of today:

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/kolkata-/Eye-for-Kolkatas-London-dreams/articleshow/10912459.cms

Creative Agency

We will soon put up several non-residential plots in New Town Rajarhat for bid. We need a designing and creative team to help us design our campaign. There was an advertisement in yesterday's papers. Here is what appeared :

Rabindra Tirtha Kendra : Progress

I inspected the site of Rabindra Tirtha Kendra today. There was a Supervisor with whom I talked. There was quite a progress but I told General Manager (E) that more machines may be allocated. Here is a picture with my office in background:

In the morning, I, alongwith GM(E) Mr Arijit Sanyal met Mr Jogen Chowdhury, painter, to seek his advice on whom to contact for Rabindranath's statue. Here is a picture with him at his residence taken today morning:



GIS for Rajarhat New Town

Yesterday we held a long meeting with the scientific officers of the Science and Technology Department about creating a Geographical Information System for New Town, using satellite data and land & building data bank. The point that I emphasized was that (a) it should be time bound and payment will be milestone based with penalties for delay in a graded manner (for example, if the 3rd milestone was delayed by two weeks, a 2% deduction would be made, a 3% deduction for four week delay and so on) (b)it should integrate mouza plot and hidco plots numbers (c) we should be able to see time series ie how constructions were happening over the years. They have promised that they will revert with a proposal.

Committee of Beautification Meet on Board MV Sarbajaya

We held the meeting yesterday on launch. Here is a picture in Pratidin

Infosys & Wipro Land

We had a meeting yesterday with Minister of IT regarding land for Infosys and Wipro at 4 Camac Street building. I reconnected with some of the old staff when I was Chief Electoral Officer in 2006 onwards. There were some panchayat representatives and some there was some loudness. Here is a story that appeared in today's Times of India:

Airport Modernisation; Digha Beach Festival

Yesterday there was a Regional Review of JnNURM projects by Mr Sudhir Krishna, Secretary, GoI, UD. Besides West Bengal, Jharkhand and Orissa were there. It seems, West Bengal is doing fairly well.
In the afternoon, Mr Krishna went to HIDCO. Senior officers of CPWD were also there. It seems, the Airport Authorities need some land from CPWD who needs to be compensated for the land so given up. The CPWD has asked for a 5-6 acre plot in Rajarhat New Town for this. Suman Chakrabarti of Times of India spoke to me. Here is his report in today's TOI:

* * *
The Tourism Department held a review meeting on Digha yesterday. I couldn't attend as I was engaged in the Regional Workshop. DSDA & BUIDL attended. Today's Telegraph carries this story:

No Facebook / Blogging in China..

Just back from China. Went to Beijing and Xiamen. Amazing China experience. Here is a picture in a yatch in the marina at Xiamen. But there was no facebook. There was no blogging allowed. Such restrictions make me value the freedoms we experience daily in India.