Gurgaon Metropolitan Authority gets CEO

CM Manohar Lal Khattar announced this while he was attending the Independence Day celebrations at Tau Devi Lal Stadium in Gurgaon. IAS officer Anand Mohan Sharan will have the additional charge of the chief executive officer of the Gurgaon Metropolitan Development Authority.

Haryana chief minister on Tuesday announced that senior IAS officer Anand Mohan Sharan will have the additional charge of the chief executive officer of the Gurgaon Metropolitan Development Authority (GMDA).

Earlier, in April, the state cabinet had approved the GMDA bill, which was later cleared through an ordinance in May. (Parveen Kumar/HT File)

CM Manohar Lal Khattar announced this while he was attending the Independence Day celebrations at Tau Devi Lal Stadium in Gurgaon. The state government released a notification for formation of the authority on Monday after the governor of Haryana gave his nod.

“Anand Mohan Sharan, the principal secretary, Urban Local Bodies (ULB), Haryana, will have the additional charge as CEO of GMDA. V Umashankar, the commissioner of Municipal Corporation of Gurugram (MCG), will continue to work as GMDA’s officer on special duty (OSD),” said Khattar.

Earlier, in April, the state cabinet had approved the GMDA bill, which was later cleared through an ordinance in May.

MCG commissioner V Umashankar, the architect of the GMDA draft, said, “It is a new type of urban governance. It looks at coordination among different agencies in the district to provide infrastructure development, better mobility and a better urban environment.”

It is worth noting that Gurgaon has been expanded multiple times in the last four decades, with the development of 115 sectors by the Haryana Urban Development Authority (Huda). The MCG area is 231 square kilometres while the GMDA area extends up to 675 square kilometres, in areas that are two kilometres beyond the Kundli-Manesar-Palwal (KMP) Expressway.

Several villages around KMP will come under GMDA for urban development, said Khattar.

When asked about financial resources of GMDA, the CM said, “GMDA will have funds from the corpus and annual sources such as from cess on property tax, liquor, stamp duty etc. It will also get a share of the external development charges (EDC).”

It is also worth noting that the officials are working on to minimise the areas of conflict between GMDA and MCG.

“The conflict over jurisdictions between GMDA and MCG is being resolved. There is no issue of conflict in this regard between GMDA and the Huda,” a senior official present at the occasion said.

Dharam Sagar, a senior resident of Sector 4, said, “We appreciate the government for finally giving us good news. We hope that development will be much better under GMDA.”