Thursday, 17 AUGUST 2023 | PNS | DEHRADUN

The Metro Neo project of Uttarakhand Metro Rail Corporation appears to be in jeopardy as the Board Members of the Municipal Corporation of Dehradun (MCD) unanimously rejected the proposal to hand over about 3515.25 square metres of  Gandhi Park’s land for the project. The decision was taken in MCD’s board meeting on Wednesday. Stating that water accumulation in the premises of several private and semi-government hospitals can aggravate the spread of dengue, the mayor Sunil Uniyal ‘Gama’ directed the officials to send notices to all such hospitals. He took this decision after councillors expressed their disappointment with inefficient management and sanitation conditions in the city regarding dengue prevention. Besides this, several decisions were taken in the meeting which was also joined by municipal commissioner Manuj Goyal and MLAs Umesh Sharma Kau and Khajan Das. The board members approved the proposal of twinning Dehradun with a Romanian city Piatra Neamt for sustainable development of the city. Most of the proposals were passed by the members. The commissioner also expressed his disappointment over entangled cable wires left hanging on electric poles to the officials. He said that most of these wires are from telecom and TV cable providers who sometimes do not even remove old and damaged wires before installing new ones. He asked the officials of Uttarakhand Power Corporation Limited (UPCL) to coordinate with agencies concerned to ensure cables are installed systematically within September. If officials fail to do so in the stipulated time, MCD will cut down all these cables and UPCL will be responsible for all the chaos caused among locals. A councillor also complained that old telephone poles of BSNL which are not functional anymore are encroaching on roads. He claimed that these poles are useless as even street lights cannot be installed on them. He claimed that most of these poles are presently being used by Jio Telecom which is also questionable. Responding to the issue, the commissioner said that he was not aware of this issue but he will act to take cognisance after holding a meeting with BSNL officials. Goyal asked the councillors to coordinate with Jal Sansthan and ensure the pipelines broken during any construction work are repaired by the same contractor immediately rather than waiting to get it repaired by the latter as it causes unnecessary delay.