Top-down or bottom-upIJ
Despite the State Government being sure that cracking the disciplinary whip on the State Secretariat would work wonder down the line, things might not prove so, believe many. True, the new Government has imposed a string of measures to make the officers and employees of the secretariat to conform to discipline. Those running the Government believe that as discipline works top-down the measures to enforce discipline in the Secretariat would help them to make those working in the district and tehsil levels to fall in line with the rules. However, many State watchers are convinced that things should have started bottom-up with the common people interacting daily with the district and the tehsil level officials to have their grievances addressed. They are sceptic over whether the top-down approach would show the desired result. They cite the rising number of people attending the Chief Minister’s Janta Darshan programmes being held at the CM residence to buttress their point. Though CMO flaunts it as an indication of the surging popularity graph of the CM they opine that this indicates the growing frustration of the people with the laid-back attitude of the district and tehsil level administration.
‘Plaza-myopic’
With the Dehradun administration being engaged in freeing the bustling market areas of the city from the encroaching shop owners-the important places seeing the drive include Paltan Bazaar and Transport Nagar-many are casting doubt over the intention behind the drive. They say that it seems to be part of a well-though-out plan to make the markets give way to the Malls. No matter whether the version of the carping critics holds water or not, it is intriguing that the administration is doing nothing to free the basements of the plazas from the shops that are mushrooming there, flouting the norms of the basement being meant exclusively for parking facilities. The people who throng them are being made to cough up fines as they are perforce parking their vehicles on the roadsides. The question thus raised is relevant, as the administration is citing the logic of enabling the shoppers to park their vehicles behind the ongoing anti-encroachment drive. Stretching the same logic a little more, the administration is expected to free the basements of the multi-story plazas from the shops to provide parking facilities they are meant for.