State aims at litter-free urban local bodies in one year

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Bhubaneswar: With a view to improving sanitation facilities in urban areas, the state government has set a target to make all 114 urban local bodies (ULBs) of the state waste-free within a year.
Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik has made this announcement while launching a slew of projects at a state-level function through videoconferencing on the occasion of Local Self Government Day here, Saturday.
He said efforts are on to involve women (mother) in the programme. He said better service delivery is the main objective of local self government.
“Nowadays, management of various developmental projects has become a challenging task but we can bring the change that people wanted if we start working keeping the people at the centre of each programme,” Patnaik said.
On the occasion, the Chief Minister launched the programme to open ward offices in all the 2,035 wards in the ULBs across the state. The purpose of the ward office is to create a unified and inclusive platform where participation, planning and implementation can function in synergy and decrease the gap between the citizens and governance bodies.
The ward office will look into micro-level monitoring related to sanitation, drainage, waste management, development and maintenance of infrastructure, better delivery of citizens services, efficient grievance redressal and increase in revenue collection.
In Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation (BMC), ward offices will be opened at all the 67 wards. Each ward office will have one ward officer, a junior engineer, a community organiser, a sanitary inspector, one misc sarkar, a light jamadar and a data entry operator to address various grievances of the people.
The Chief Minister also launched online issuance of marriage certificate, micro composing centre, solid waste management, provision for online approval of building plan of Bhubaneswar Development Authority (BDA).
As per the announcement, the BDA will now provide approval of building plan within 48 hours to people who want to construct small houses in Bhubaneswar. Under the scheme, people can apply for housing plan based on 100 pre-approved plans. The system would be implemented in all the cities in the state in phases.
Patnaik also started the process of providing assistance online to small traders of Puri affected by Cyclone Fani. As many as 4,103 vendors were affected in Puri by the cyclonic storm. In the first phase 1,369 vendors were given Rs 10,000 each Saturday.
He said the mantra of five Ts – Technology, Transparency, Team Work, Transformation and Time limit – will be applied to these programmes.
On the occasion, foundation stone was laid for 342 micro-compost units in 114 ULBs and 40 treatment plants in 26 ULBs at a cost of Rs 70 crore with a capacity to treat four lakh litres of waste water which would benefit around eight lakh people.