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Night brushing of city roads to re-start

Wednesday, 22 January 2014 05:41 administrator
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The Times of India               22.01.2014

Night brushing of city roads to re-start

SURAT: Once applauded for its innovative ways of keeping the city clean, Surat was slipping on the cleanliness index since a year . The reason- gradual decay in the operating system of night cleaning brushing of roads through contract led to number of issues including misappropriation of funds and contractors doing a shabby job

The situation got so bad that Surat Municipal corporation (SMC) stopped the cleaning and brushing contracts and started getting the city roads brushed through their own daily wagers.

"Delegations from other cities used to visit our city to observe our night brushing and cleaning activities and implement our methods in their cities," said Rajesh Desai, chairman of the Standing Committee.

"We thought this is our USP and we can't let it slip away. So we have decided to re start the activity with new system," he added.

Allocation of Rs 1.75 crore for night brushing of city roads in this year's budget indicates that the activity would be restarted immediately. Tenders would be called for and with strict compliance conditions.

It was after the plague of 1994 the new concept of night brushing and cleaning was introduced. It went on successfully for more than 15 years making Surat a model city in the country. It was ranked in top three cleanest city of the nation .

Even today city ranks in top three cleanest city of the country and spends more than Rs 4 crore to keep it self clean but night cleaning and brushing has stopped from last one year.

 

Local swimmers top Navi Mumbai mayor cup championship

Wednesday, 22 January 2014 05:32 administrator
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The Times of India               22.01.2014

Local swimmers top Navi Mumbai mayor cup championship

THANE: Local swimmers made a mark at the Navi Mumbai Mayor Cup Swimming Championship held at Navi Mumbai Sports Association, Vashi, on Sunday.

Elite swimmers Trisha Karkhanis, Nupur Kadam, Anya Tyagi, Atharv Phadke, Ashmi Joshi, Ved Sarmukadam, Atahrv Jarange and Shamli Pardeshi left a mark by winning individual championship titles in their respective categories.

National medal winner Karkhanis won four gold medals in her pet events, 100m and 200m freestyle, 100m butterfly and 100m back stroke that propelled her to claim the championship in the under-14 girls' group.

"It was easy sailing at the district level meet after establishing a name in the national arena," said Karkhanis.

Similarly, the boys' group in this section was won by Phadke who bagged four gold and a silver medal. He got gold in 100m and 200m freestyle, 100m butterfly and 100m back stroke and silver in 100m breast stroke. Sarmukadam and Joshi swept home the under-10 boys' and girls' titles whereas Jarange and Pardeshi topped the under-8 boys' and girls' section. Tyagi dominated the under-12 girls' group and Kadam emerged champion in under-17 girls' segment.

National medal winner Trisha Karkhanis won four gold medals in her pet events, 100m and 200m freestyle, 100m butterfly and 100m back stroke that propelled her to claim the championship in the under-14 girls' group.

 

Greater Visakhapatnam Municipal Corporation's hi-tech water metering system earns kudos

Wednesday, 22 January 2014 05:01 administrator
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The Times of India               22.01.2014

Greater Visakhapatnam Municipal Corporation's hi-tech water metering system earns kudos

VISAKHAPATNAM: The Greater Visakhapatnam Municipal Corporation's (GVMC) efforts to tackle revenue losses arising out of water supply to bulk consumers, most of whom are giant industrial units and public sector units like Visakha refinery of Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Limited (HPCL), Eastern Naval Command, Visakhapatnam Port Trust, with the installation of wireless digital water metering system seems to have come in for praise from the Union ministry of urban development (MoUD).

MoUD has not only evinced interest in replicating GVMC's wireless digital metering system in other cities but has also decided to give Vizag's civic body the National Urban Water Award 2011-12 in the financial reform category, GVMC commissioner MV Satyanarayana said.

As per Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission ( JNNURM) guidelines, GVMC decided to adopt the system to usher in accountability in water supply and check revenue losses arising out of water leakages as well as fraudulent practices in metering, supply and revenue collection.

GVMC invited Expression of Interest (EoI) for installation of digital water meters in January 2010. VFC, which was among the two parties that applied for the project, was selected by way of an open tender and awarded the work on a build, operate and transfer (BOT) basis. VLC imported the digital meters, each of which costs Rs 3.5 lakh, from German player Siemens and started installing the water meters in June 2010 and completed installations by December 2010.

After conducting awareness camps among its 77 bulk users, GVMC officially started implementing the digital water metering system from March, 2011. Prior to this, GVMC used to depend on mechanized water meters to measure the quantum of water supplied to industries and charge them for water usage.

"The earlier mechanized meters with obstruct technology were installed by consumers themselves. Due to their (meters) defective working, a lot of water used to be wasted and was unaccounted for, affecting water supply to the general public. Despite several reminders by GVMC, the industrial consumers did not change the meters," said the GVMC chief.

I Ramesh Raju, managing partner, Vin Flow Controls (VFC), which designed the wireless water metering system and will be taking care of its maintenance till March 2016, said GVMC is the first urban civic body in the country to adopt the fully automated water supply metering system.

"After installation of the digital water meters at a cost of Rs 3.5 crore, GVMC is now able to garner Rs 7.5 crore per month by supplying approximately 15 million gallons per day (MGD) to 77 bulk consumers as against only around Rs 5 crore from the same connections prior to March 2011. This is a nearly 40-50% increase in revenue collection and has resulted in increased accountability in supply of water at both ends," Ramesh Raju said.

 
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