NEW DELHI: Nine months after it was constructed, the new underground parking facility with a capacity to park over 400 cars become operational at AIIMS on Monday.

The three-level underground parking, foundation stone of which was laid down in October 2011 and constructed in August 2012, was inaugurated on Monday by Union health minister Ghulam Nabi Azad.

Constructed with the stipulated project cost of Rs 53.57 crore, the parking has a total covered area of 21742 square meters and capacity to park 434 four wheelers.

Inaugurating the parking lot, Azad said construction work on the project was started in November 2011 and was completed in August 2012, around three months ahead of its schedule time.

"However, the facility could not be put into use pending clearance from various government agencies. We have immediately made it operational after getting required clearances", Azad said, adding clearance for such projects should be but on fast rack.

The AIIMS administration said, "Final statutory approval by New Delhi Municipal Corporation was granted on May 5 this year."

The multi-level parking would help decongestion of the AIIMS premises where, according to the recent traffic survey, approximately 14000 vehicle including 5000 cars enters everyday.

"As of now, AIIMS has parking capacity of less than 1000 cars, nearly 2/3rd of which is used to park vehicles of AIIMS faculty and staff members. The facility would help decongestion of the campus", the minister said, adding AIIMS would need facilities to park over 10,000 vehicles in coming years as large number of new units will come up in the institute under its ongoing expansion plan.

Stating that provisions in the existing Master Plan have already been exploited to develop new centers in the AIIMS, Azad emphasised on the need to rapidly develop new Master Plan for the institute.

He informed the audience that the new plan has already been cleared by the NDMC and would be sent to Delhi Urban Art Commission for further clearance.

Asked about the six AIIMS-like institutes, Azad said MBBS courses have already been commenced in the institutes and first phase of the treatment facilities would be operational by August.

"Super-speciality facilities would start functioning by December this year", he said.

LUDHIANA: Even after warnings from the municipal corporation to get illegal water connections regularized by March 31 this year, more than one lakh residents failed to register themselves with the civic body. During inspection, out of the 2.38 lakh connections in the city, more than one lakh connections were found illegal.

"We had asked residents to get their connections regularized by March 31 without any fine but they did not come forward. Now we will take strict action against defaulters," said Manjit Singh, additional commissioner (technical), operation and management.

According to an official report, only 6,250 connections have been regularized till date. The report states that despite the depletion level of water table in Ludhiana, 35% of total water supply is wasted every day.

According to MC zonal commissioner (zone A) Kamal Bansal, a person's requirement of water per day is 155 liters, but due to the illegal connections the requirement is never completed. "We have warned them to get their connections regularized in two weeks, otherwise penalty will be imposed," he said.