Third eye on staff at Ghaziabad development authority soon

Top officials have sought installation of CCTV cameras inside the authority’s offices

The conduct and activities of officials of the Ghaziabad Development Authority (GDA) will be under the scanner, as the top officials have sought installation of CCTV cameras at different offices at the authority’s headquarters.

Three authority officials have been deputed to examine the CCTV footage and monitor the conduct of officials with the public.

The officials said that the move is aimed at bringing more transparency in public dealing and also to keep a watch on visitors. Presently, there are CCTV cameras in the corridors of the GDA headquarters, but many of them are non-functional.

“We have nearly 50 CCTVs in our corridors. Now, we will have CCTVs inside the office rooms where our staff deals with the general public. We will also connect these CCTVs to a dashboard in the offices of the vice-chairman, secretary and the chief engineer. Three officers have been deputed to examine the footage and monitor the conduct of officials with the general public,” Ritu Maheshwari, vice chairperson, GDA, said.

The vice chairperson has also directed the maintenance agency to fix the non-functional cameras installed in different corridors.

The move comes after the GDA recently showed the door to 11 staff who are over 50 years of age and were named in criminal cases pertaining to cheating and forgery, among others. A majority of them were allegedly found to be involved in irregular allotment of plots, re-allotments and even forging official documents during their service.

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The action was taken on the recommendation of a screening-committee formed to weed out ‘underperforming’ staff members.

The GDA staff and officers were also found to be involved in irregular re-allotment of 139 cancelled plots under Swarn Jayanti Puram housing scheme. The names of several other officers have also been sent to state administration following an initial inquiry.

According to official sources, the GDA headquarters has nearly 50 different rooms for staff and officers where physical scanning of activities of staff is not possible. At present, the authority has nearly 1,200 staff and officers across grades A, B, C and D.

“The installation of CCTVs will help us monitor the conduct and activities of our staff and ensure transparency in our day-to-day functioning. The authority recently introduced biometric attendance to ensure regular attendance monitoring,”an officer said.