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Cleaner city in offing as VMC to hire more workers

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The Times of India                  14.03.2013  

Cleaner city in offing as VMC to hire more workers

VARANASI: After much wait, the people will finally be able to see a clean city. According to municipal commissioner, RP Singh, shortage of cleaning staff is likely to come to an end this month as the tenders for outsourcing of cleaning staff will open on March 18. VMC is looking forward to hire 200 workers on contract.

According to Singh, the present number of workers, which is 600, was insufficient to take the load of cleaning the entire city. In fact around 100 workers were outsourced from village areas of the district from February 26 to March 10, keeping in view the heavy influx of tourists and pilgrims in this period.

According to Singh, as many as 25 extra cleaning staff is still operating near prominent ghats, and other places like, Godowlia, Chowk, Maidagin and Sonarpura where the crowd is dense. The extra staff will be operating twice a day till March 18.

However, a reality check at prominent ghats and areas near major temples of the city revealed harsh facts about the cleanliness drive of VMC.

Floral and devotional wastes were found lying on the stairs of Dashaswamedh ghat, Sheetla ghat, Rajendra Prasad ghat and Darbhanga ghat. Similarly, the situation was worse at Dashaswamedh road, Chowk, Maidagin and Godowlia areas which were cluttered with food packets, edibles, wastes, poly bags and floral garbage.

According to nagar health officer, BK Singh, all the manpower and resources are being used in tackling the situation. The work is going at a good pace and it will take two more days to clear the clutter from the city.
Last Updated on Friday, 15 March 2013 09:41
 

PMC to award 5 cleanest housing societies every year

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The Indian Express                 14.03.2013

PMC to award 5 cleanest housing societies every year

To encourage good civic practices among citizens, the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) has decided to award five cooperative housing societies for maintaining cleanliness on their premises and judiciously using water.

After the coordination committee meeting of all party leaders, Mayor Vaishali Bankar said public participation was required to inculcate civic sense among citizens and the PMC initiative would help in achieving it.

"Every year the civic body would select five housing societies for best civic practices and give them awards," she said.

The performance would be based on cleanliness of the housing society premises, effective management of solid waste generated there and proper use of water, along with timely payment of property tax by residents.

"This is the beginning of a plan to encourage citizens to join hands with PMC in making the city beautiful," said NCP leader Subhash Jagtap.

In last year's budget, the PMC had announced that the best performing electoral ward would be rewarded with additional funds for carrying development work in their respective areas. The PMC is now all set to complete the process of selecting four electoral wards for the award.

"The scheme of awarding electoral wards would continue and it requires citizens, elected representatives and civic staff to join hands, while the scheme for housing societies would be completely with the citizens for their performance," said Jagtap.

The coordination committee unanimously decided that the benches, bus stops and signages from civic funds would not have names of local representatives from now onwards.

"There will be uniformity in the size and colour of the bus stops, benches and signages across the city. There will be no names of any local corporator on it," added Jagtap.

NCP spokesperson Ankush Kakade said he had been demanding that the civic administration should stop the wrong practice of allowing names of local corporators on the benches, buckets and bus stops from civic funds. "It is a welcome step to not allow the names of corporators on civic properties, but it has to be strictly implemented," he added.

The Sajag Nagrik Manch, too, had requested the municipal commissioner to direct civic officers to stop the practice.

More Aadhaar registration centres to speed up drive

To speed up Aadhaar enrolment, the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) has decided to start two registration centres each in the 76 electoral panels.

"The PMC has registered 17.50 lakh citizens for Aadhaar so far. There has been a rush for registration and to ensure that more citizens get registered as soon as possible there would be centres to be opened at each of electoral panel," said Mangesh Joshi, Deputy Municipal Commissioner.

He said the civic administration plans to cover 80 per cent of the citizens by the end of the year as additional machines for Aadhaar registration have been made available for the city.

Joshi said the civic administration had conducted a special drive in schools of the city to enroll as many students as possible for Aadhaar registration .

 

Panel to monitor restoration of statue

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The Times of India                        14.03.2013  

Panel to monitor restoration of statue

MALAPPURAM: An all-party meeting convened by the Kottakkal municipality on Wednesday decided to set up a special committee to monitor the functioning of the O V Vijayan memorial park (Smrithivanam) at the Government Raja's High School, Kottakkal.

The meeting was held to discuss the issue related to the vandalization of writer Vijayan's statue installed at the park. The committee headed by A P Abdu Samad Samadani, MLA, will monitor the reconstruction of the statue and maintenance of the park.

The meeting also decided to pressure the police to intensify the probe into the incident.

The committee comprises representatives of all political parties and Kottakkal Aryavaidyasala and the principal, headmaster and PTA president of the school.

The statue of Vijayan, an alumnus of the school, was found vandalized on March 7.

There was a dispute over the installation of statue between the IUML-ruled municipality and the school.
Last Updated on Thursday, 14 March 2013 12:01
 


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