By IANS,
Lucknow : Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati is keen to see her state sparkling clean and has got cracking down on senior officials to ensure that it is done. The effect: a senior minister and top officials can be seen early in the morning on the streets of Lucknow literally wielding the broom.
Realising that her government was drawing a lot of criticism due to the poor civic amenities, the chief minister decided to take Urban Development Minister Nakul Dubey and concerned officials to task at a meeting earlier this week.
Dubey and his department got on to their toes promptly after that. The minister is now regularly seen along the filthy lanes and bylanes of Lucknow early in the morning. And in tow are Principal Secretary (Urban Development) Alok Ranjan as well as the municipal commissioner.
Ranjan has even sought the services of former Surat municipal commissioner S.R.Rao, who had shot to fame for controlling the plague in the Gujarat city in 1994 and transforming it into one of the cleanest cities of the country.
Currently posted as additional secretary in the union information technology ministry, Rao was invited to make a presentation before district magistrates and municipal chiefs of 15 major cities of the state Saturday.
Following this, instructions were Sunday issued to ensure that all civic functionaries connected with sanitation report to duty on dot at 7 a.m.
The municipal commissioners of 14 other major cities – Allahabad, Kanpur, Varanasi, Agra, Meerut, Ghaziabad, Bareilly, Aligarh, Moradabad, Jhansi, Saharanpur, Gorakhpur and Gautam Budh Nagar (Noida) – have been asked to follow course with effect from Monday.
The chief minister’s office Sunday morning also issued a circular urging civic officials to get the cleaning of busy commercial areas carried out at night.
The chief minister’s next target is drinking water.
An alert has already been sounded to the officials concerned to prepare a chart related to drinking water problems and proposed solutions for the 15 cities to begin with.