Smart City Project: 10 months on, no funds for CM’s Karnal
APATHY MC hasn’t even received the first instalment of ₹200 crore from the Union govt
KARNAL: Even after 10 months of being included in the Smart City project of the Union government, the Karnal municipal corporation has still not received its first instalment of ₹200 under the project.
Karnal is the home constituency of chief minister (CM) Manohar Lal Khattar and in all, ₹1,295 crore are to be spent by the Union government on development projects proposed by the MC under the project.
Besides, the appointment of project management consultant (PMC), who will be responsible to carry out the required works in the constituency for the project, is hanging fire since several months. However, the tenders for the PMC’s appointment have been floated by the MC.
Meanwhile, officials of the civic body said they had taken up the issue of pending first instalment with the concerned department of the Union government but they were cited shortage of funds to be the reason for the same. The request however has again been initiated by the MC to the Union government.
As of now, the MC has started work on small projects like city bus service and installation of CCTV cameras.
INCLUSION IN THE PROJECT
Karnal was included in the list of smart cities in June last year and the first instalment was expected to reach within a month. But with the present circumstances, no deadline has been fixed for completion of the projects.
OFFICIAL TAKE
Meanwhile, municipal commissioner Priyanka Soni said, “We submitted our claim for the first instalment in January this year and the allocation was delayed due to shortage of funds.”
She however, said that progress on all major works, including Mughal Canal Phase 2 and 3, is underway and a few projects will also be inaugurated by the end of this month.
On delay in the PMC’s appointment, she said that efforts were on for the appointment and also claimed that as compared to other cities under the project, Karnal’s progress was good.
Meanwhile, the civic body has prepared a blueprint of projects of ₹1,295 crore for Karnal Smart City Project, under which, all roads leading to Karnal will be four-laned and welcome gates named after Guru Nanak Dev, the founder of Sikhism, will be built at Chirawa Mor, Pt Deen Dayal Upadhyaya gate on Meerut road, Srimad Bhagwad Gita gate on Ambala side of the Grand Trunk Road, Saraswati gate at Kunjpura road, Swami Vivekananda gate at Kachhwa road and Kalpana Chawla gate on Munak road, besides, expenditure of crores on smart roads, cleanliness, better transportation and other facilities. The delay may also cost heavily to the ruling BJP as the Smart City Project was a prestigious project of the BJP government and the party may face tough challenge in the coming MC elections in June.