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Corporation lowers dog registration fee from Rs 5000 to Rs 1000, clears proposals for land for RRTS and electric-bus projects
The Ghaziabad municipal corporation on Saturday decided to reduce the fee it plans to introduce for the registration on pet dogs from ₹5,000 to ₹1,000.
The Ghaziabad municipal corporation on Saturday decided to reduce the fee it plans to introduce for the registration on pet dogs from ₹5,000 to ₹1,000.
The officials said the decision was taken up by the corporation board in its meeting. The officials said the fee for the registration of pet dogs in the city was reduced in the wake of a number of complaints the pet owners made to the corporation demanding a reduction in the fees. On September 13, during a board meeting, the corporation had passed a resolution to charge a fee of ₹5,000 to dog owners to get their pet dogs registered.
“The decision to reduce the one time registration fee from ₹5,000 to ₹1,000 was unanimously taken by the board. We will now make bylaws and chalk out further modalities on the planned registration about which the residents will be informed soon. The decision was taken in view of complaints and demands of residents which flowed in after the ₹5,000 fee was announced earlier,” Dinesh Chandra Singh, municipal commissioner, said.
The officials, however, added that the pet owners will be charged a penalty of ₹500 per instance if their pet is found defecating in public places.
Apart from reducing the fees, the board also cleared the proposal for giving away land from a city forest area for the Regional Rapid Transit System (RRTS) project in the Saturday meeting and also proposed charging facilities and a depot for electric buses.
The board cleared the proposal for parting away with around 4,000 square metres (sqm) of land in Hindon eco-park which is located in the city forest area near the GT Road—popularly known Sai Upvan. The officials said the land was sought for the construction of an electricity sub-station for the RRTS project which proposes to run high speed trains between Delhi, Ghaziabad and Meerut.
“Since the RRTS is a government project and involves the Centre and the state government we cleared the proposal and will send all the required documents to the state government for finalising the proposal,” Asha Sharma, city mayor, said.
However, some of the councillors raised objections about handing over the land parcel from the city forest area.
“The land use does not permit any non-forest activity over the city forest land. Instead of developing greenery and planting trees over the land, it has been given for the RRTS project. The eco-park was constructed after a lot of agitation by environmentalists in 2008-09. It involved a cost of about ₹4.5 crore which will now go in vain,” councillor Rajendra Tyagi said.
The board also cleared a proposal for allowing over 18,000sqm of land to be used for the construction of a charging station, bus shelter, workshop and a sub-station for the electric-bus project. Under the planned electric-bus project, Ghaziabad is supposed to get around 100 buses from the state government.
“The proposal was cleared by the board and the land will be identified. There is land available in ward 2 (Rahul Vihar – Siddharth Vihar) which will be inspected before finalisation,” the mayor added.
