Indian Express 15.03.2010
Contractor to provide gatekeepers Mohali
Express News Service Tags : security Posted: Monday , Mar 15, 2010 at 0308 hrs
Mohali: Mohali : Security gates have been lying defunct for seven months for lack of personnelAlmost seven months after remaining defunct, the security gates installed to check the recent spurt of thefts in Mohali, would soon become functional.
A private company, which had installed 39 security gates in all 11 phases under the Mohali Municipal Council (MC) limits in August last, has agreed to provide gatekeepers to man the gates.
Till now, the gates installed to keep a round-the-clock vigil and check the entry and exit of visitors, had failed to serve the purpose as nobody was deputed to operate them.
Confirming the development, MC president Rajinder Rana said that after the issue was raised at a recent House meeting, a joint meeting was held with the contractor in the presence of SSP Gurpreet Singh Bhullar, wherein the contractor agreed to provide gatekeepers within a month. “Gatekeepers have already been deputed at some gates while the rest will also be made operational shortly,” said Rana.
Municipal councillor Kuljit Singh Bedi, who had raised the issue in the meeting on March 3 and December 31 as well, said the House had also resolved to ask the contractor to re-design the gates and make them look attractive besides removing other shortcomings.
“We have given a last chance to the contractor to make gates operational and purposeful or his contract would be cancelled and new gates would be installed by the civic body,” added Bedi, a senior Congress leader.
The gates were installed on the Build-Operate-Transfer (BOT) basis by a private contractor, who was to operate the gates for six years before transferring them to MC for future operation.
Though the gates failed to secure the area, the contractor had started earning revenue by giving out advertisement rights.
As per the scheme, the entry and exit of the phases was to restricted through a specific gate. The opening and closing timings of the gates and ways to check entry of outsiders was left to the discretion of residents but there is no such system in place yet.
It was on the recommendation of former SSP Jatinder Singh Aulakh that the MC had unanimously resolved to install security gates during its meeting on February 27 last year.
