Five months on, MC fails to implement citizen charter - Hindustan Times
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Five months on, MC fails to implement citizen charter

HindustanTimes | ByHiliary Victor, Chandigarh
Feb 01, 2016 11:55 AM IST

Development works in the city continue to miss deadlines as the Chandigarh municipal corporation (MC) has failed to implement the Citizen Charter Act despite getting a nod from the UT administration. The Act was to be implemented from October 1 last year.

Development works in the city continue to miss deadlines as the Chandigarh municipal corporation (MC) has failed to implement the Citizen Charter Act despite getting a nod from the UT administration. The Act was to be implemented from October 1 last year.

At the MC House meeting in November last year, mayor Arun Sood, who was in opposition then, had said his first priority would be to implement the charter if elected to the top post. However, making a U-turn on coming to power, he now says the MC will improve the infrastructure before implementing the Act.

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The Citizen Charter Act fixes the time period for all kinds of civic works and also a penalty of

` 10 per day on officials delaying the work. The Act was approved by the MC House amid uproar in September 8 last year. The house also approved that if an official is fined 20 times, disciplinary action would be taken against him or her, besides adverse remarks in the annual confidential report (ACR). The appellate authority for filing the complaint will be the chief engineer and superintending engineer.

Now, MC councillors are targeting officials and the mayor for delaying the implementation of the Act. They say since the House approved a penalty on officials for delaying work, they are reluctant to implement it.

BJP councillor Satinder Singh said MC officials know that they couldn’t complete works on time and are making excuses so the Act is not implemented.

Former mayor and Congress councillor Subhash Chawla said: “It’s the mayor’s failure. He should have got the Act implemented by now. In a House meeting last year, he promised that on coming to power, the first thing he would do was to implement the Act. But now he says the MC does not have sufficient infrastructure, so the Act could not be implemented,”

The mayor said: “We have got an approval from UT administration, but we are trying to improve the infrastructure of the civic body. Various posts are lying vacant in the civic body and I will raise the issue in the coordination committee meeting to be held on February 3. We will try to implement the Act as soon as possible. We are changing the language of Act to legal language. The Act should be implemented in proper way.”

For mer mayor Pardee p Chhabra said: “When it comes to imposing taxes and increasing fee, the MC authorities act quick, but when it’s about residents’ welfare, they continue to sleep.”

All the services dealing with the public have been kept in the citizen charter with the specific names and phone numbers of the officials concerned.

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