Delhi will be able to monitor progress of next Master Plan

NEW DELHI: A city that’s green and encourages biodiversity, is childfriendly, safe for women to commute and walk in, and has plans and systems in place to meet its housing, water and waste disposal needs — that’s what the Capital aims to be as it gets to work on the Master Plan of Delhi2041.

The objectives are clear, but getting there won’t be easy.

For the first time, the city’s development plan will have provisions to monitor its implementation on the ground — with details of how their suggestions should be implemented in specific areas. To this end, National Institute of Urban Affairs (NIUA), an autonomous research and advisory body under the ministry of housing and urban affairs, is gathering baseline information and is in talks with the Delhi government and agencies, including the Delhi Development Authority (DDA), Central Pollution Control

Board (CPCB), Delhi Police and the city’s municipal corporations. The aim to is to identify the gaps and work out ways to plug them. “We want to have inputs from various stakeholders before we start the planning process. We will complete the baselining work by April-may. This information is crucial to identify the gaps in services and policies. We will be able to address the gaps in the new master plan. It will also help in measuring the progress over the years,” said Jagan Shah, director of NIUA.

One of the main reasons for the poor implementation of the present master plan, which is valid until 2021, is the scant data available to assess its progress over the years, experts said. NIUA officials say they are now adopting a bottom-up approach towards preparing the new master plan, which will come into effect in 2021.