Friday, February 8, 2013

Directorate of town and country planning functioning without three top layers of officials



C Shivakumar

Chennai:

The directorate of town and country planning, which has about 1.28 lakh square kilometer in its jurisdiction, is functioning without the services of three layers of top officials for more than six months.

According to documents available with Express, the directorate did not fill the sanctioned posts of additional director, joint directors and deputy directors for more than six months. Sources said of the sanctioned post of one additional director, seven joint directors and 14 deputy directors, the authorities have yet to fill a single post. Some of the posts have not been filled for more than year.

Sources said that these are the top three layers of officials and are crucial for taking up any policy decision of the government.

Interestingly, the lack of adequate staff in DTCP comes in the wake of the directorate preparing Master Plan for non plan area worth 8000 square km besides launching Comprehensive Traffic and Transportation study for Coimbatore, Tiruppur, Madurai and Trichirapalli corporations. The directorate is also working on land pooling area development scheme besides unapproved layout regularization for rural and urban area.

“How would this materialize when you have no decision makers in the top. It is not only the absence of top three layers but also the lack of adequate staff in the lower level that is hampering the functioning of DTCP,” said a source on condition of anonymity.

Sources said DTCP has a total strength of 801 officials but is currently functioning with only 411 (42 per cent) officials.

“This has affected the functioning of directorate totally,” he said. Directorate of Town and Country Planning has to consolidate plans prepared by all District Planning Committees (DPCs), metropolitan planning committees besides preparation of State Spatial Plan  and State Urban Development Strategy. It also advises state government on location of special economic zones, IT parks, knowledge cities and eveolve norms and standrads for such activities

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