GHMC Commissioner Somesh Kumar said that the State Government would be issuing a GO very soon for handing over R&B roads to GHMC by duly creating a separate division to work under the GHMC.
The GHMC Commissioner, along with Special Commissioner Navin Mittal, held a review meeting with all the Zonal Commissioners, Additional Commissioners, Deputy Municipal Commissioners, Engineer-in-Chief, Superintending Engineers, Executive Engineers with regard to maintenance and repairs of roads in a phased manner to reach the targets in a time bound frame. The Commissioner said that this merger of R&B roads will protect the GHMC from public blame for no fault of GHMC as the most of the roads are being poorly maintained by R&B department till date.
The Commissioner further directed the officials of various departments to work and travel as a team and prepare a holistic plan to develop a road length while addressing various departmental issues such as sanitation, debris removal, construction of table drains, camber correction, footpaths, patch works and greenery etc., The Commissioner assured that GHMC is ready to provide all the support and directed to come up with the proposals for holistic development of 40 kilometers road in each circle in 10 days time. He further directed the Engineering officials to monitor the tender conditions at Head Office level. He further directed the Zonal Commissioners and Superintending Engineering to sit for half day in each Circle for finalizing the proposals and directed to send the proposal to the Commissioner so that the Commissioner himself or any senior officer can participate in the proceedings.
Somesh Kumar said that GHMC is planning to make specific changes in road maintenance policy by calling tenders for lump sum contract of annual maintenance of roads after completion of defect liability period of the contractor. He informed that in NDMC (New Delhi Municipal Corporation) area this system is running successfully and yielding good results. He further said that GHMC can give stretch wise contract for newer roads and for older routes we should give quantity wise contract.
The Commissioner said from the last 10 days he has inspected various sites of laying of roads and interacted with the officials and stated that the flow of traffic is so heavy while taking up the repairing works and the GHMC officials are unable to control the traffic even after late nights and GHMC is planning to complete the task by duly involving the concerned Corporators and public representatives.
Somesh Kumar instructed the Zonal Commissioners to take up a review meeting with the concerned Superintending Engineers once in a week, personally monitor the works, fix up the responsibility and to complete the works in a stipulated time. The Commissioner will be reviewing with the Zonal Commissioners and SEs twice in a month so that the progress of work and the maintenance part of the works taken up must have clear clarity so that the Commissioner can sanction more works keeping in view of their performance.
The Commissioner said that he has prepared a draft action plan and guidelines to improve the speed and the quality to know the facts to have a more focus on the clarity, as such the works which was started earlier is going to be completed in the stipulated time. He further stated that he has observed that most of the sanctioned works in the year 2008, 2009 and so on even the works have not been started as on today for such works we must involve the concerned Corporators and the public representatives to come to a conclusion to go for fresh works as we can slow down the burden from our shoulders since the works are pending since long time.
Somesh Kumar also observed that most of the roads laid are not in a level for which even sweeping machines are unable to sweep because of the levels, so the Engineering officials must come forward with the proposals to take up the leveling of the roads with the latest technology while laying the roads. He further said that roads should be good for not only for riding and also for sweeping. The Commissioner said that the time is very short and in a span of 2 to 3 months the GHMC has to take up the road repairing works on war footing basis, if not lot of works cannot be taken up when elections is announced due to elections code.
R. Dhan Singh, Engineer-in-Chief, Additional Commissioners P Venkat Rami Reddy, D Ronald Rose, N Chandra Mohan Reddy, L. Vandan Kumar, CN Raghu Prasad, S Annapurna, Zonal Commissioners, S. Hari Krishna, K Siva Parvathi, N Ravi Kiran, S Aleem Basha and Rama Krishna, Deputy Commissioners and senior officials from Engineering and Town Planning have participated in the review meeting. (INN)