Boost to urban development

TS govt asks civic bodies to submit vision documents

• Move intended to make municipalities self-reliant
• Underground drainage system and roads etc to be developed in all cities
• Funds to be allotted for works after examining all aspects

Hyderabad: The Telangana government has now come out with a novel plan for comprehensive development of the urban local bodies. From this year onwards, the government has made it mandatory that every Municipality and Municipal Corporation should prepare “a vision document” for promotion of model towns and cities in the next five years.

Earlier, the civic bodies used to prepare town planning and development of infrastructure depending on the requirements in their respective towns and cities. The State government used to provide funds to them. Under the new scheme, civic bodies have been asked to prepare “a vision document” containing elaborate year-wise plan to promote infrastructure and development activities.

The document must include the development of basic infrastructure like road network, upgradation of drainage system, solid waste management, drinking water supply, clean and green mission, tree plantation , town planning , special planning for the use of vacant government lands and the future plan to build outer ring road, connecting with the neighbouring villages and for facilitating hassle-free vehicle movement.

The Municipal Administration and Urban Development (MAUD) department had already communicated to all the 53 Municipalities and three Municipal Corporations – Karimnagar, Ramagundam and Nizamabad - to prepare the vision documents and submit them to the government. The government also told the Municipalities to implement under ground drainage system in new areas in their respective town.

The officials said the Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao was determined to streamline the urban local bodies in terms of planning on the saturation basis and make them self-reliant by increasing the revenue generation.

The Chief Minister would review the vision documents with the officials and finalise the allotment of funds to each civic body. A meeting of newly-elected representatives of the civic bodies would be held shortly, the officials said.

KCR unveils police logo

Hyderabad: Telangana State Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao launched the logo of the Telangana State Police on Tuesday. The function was attended by Home Minister Naini Narasimha Reddy, Chief Secretary Rajiv Sharma, Principal Secretary Home and other senior police officers of Telangana State.

Logo design was taken up jointly by several senior officials of Telangana State Police (TSP) and team from Administrative Staff College of India (ASCI). The process that was followed formed the basis for sifting, identifying the artist to develop the logo and working with the artist. The first step taken was to develop the core values that the police force stands for and wants its personnel to imbibe. Team of senior police officials headed by DGP Anurag Sharma and Police Commissioners of Hyderabad and Cyberabad – P Mahender Reddy and CV Anand-- along with the team from ASCI held several rounds of interactions to identify 25-30 aspects that the police force wants its personnel to imbibe and exude. These were then condensed by bringing together the correlated aspects reflecting three core values --Honour, Duty and Compassion.

The design by Laxman Aelay, a renowned artist from Telangana, was found to be representing what the team wanted to convey through its proposed logo. The team at ASCI then briefed Aelay and worked with him closely to develop several options to arrive at final three designs from which one final design was selected.