Tiruchi civic body struggles to give a push to projects
At a face-to-face meet with members of a consumer
organisation last month, Corporation Commissioner V.P.Thandapani dwelt
at length on the expectations of the residents for a world-class city
and their angst over the shortcomings of the civic infrastructure. He
went on to explain the limitations of the civic body, its attempts to
overcome the problems and his own attempts to study the requirements of
the city to plan for improvement in certain civic services.
The best-laid plans of the corporation notwithstanding, 2012 did not
make much of a difference for the residents as the city did not see any
major improvement in civic amenities or infrastructure.
Given the severe resource crunch that leaves it perennially looking up
to the government or financial agencies for capital investments, the
corporation has not been able to push through many of its development
projects during the past year too.
Bereft of any
long term plans to raise its revenue and about 69 per cent of its
revenue expenditure going towards salaries and pension, the civic body
has not been able to execute even many of its Budgetary works for
2012-13. The Budget by itself betrayed lack of ideas and was replete
with reiteration of commitments to implement several pending projects.
Some of new announcements such as a proposal to establish a bus stand
at Srirangam remain on paper with the civic body yet to finalise even
the site for the facility. Plans on establishing two-wheeler parking
lots at Chathram Bus Stand and Gandhi Market, a slaughter house for
goats and a modern fish market and building foot overbridges at a couple
of places are among the projects that have failed to take off from the
drawing board stage.
The Rs.221.42-crore drinking
water supply augmentation scheme, funded by the Japan International
Cooperation Agency, expected to be commissioned this year, still
meanders to overshoot deadlines. An ambitious city beautification
initiative appears to be enmeshed in procedural knots.
The corporation still continues to dither on the much-debated proposals
such as establishing an integrated bus stand, shifting of the wholesale
section of the Gandhi Market to the outskirts of the city and
improvement in the solid waste handling and management, especially at
its Ariyamangalam garbage dump.
In fact, civic
officials and even the corporation council has been studiously skirting
the issues of integrated bus stand and shifting of the Gandhi Market
this year.
For these and other projects, the
corporation has been awaiting capital infusion from the government. The
civic body is pinning its hopes now on getting the city included under
the Jawaharlal National Urban Renewal Mission and is engaged in drawing
up a city development plan through a consultant.
But the corporation has not been able to come up with any long term vision to enhance its revenue.
Although
an attempt was made to revive the project to construct a commercial
complex at Yanaikulam, by going in for an out-of-court settlement with a
litigant, there has not been much forward movement on the issue off
late.
“The corporation has to explore ways to
improve its revenue by putting its assets and properties in the city to
better use,” feels N.Ramakrishnan, a civic activist.
With the city boundaries being expanded and five new wards added to the
corporation consequent to delimitation, civic planners would have to
come up with a focused approach for the overall improvement to the civic
infrastructure to meet the city’s growing needs.
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