The public should be able to see the working of the Government at the ground level, said the Urban Development and Housing Minister Madan Kaushik. The Minister said this while chairing a review meeting at the secretariat here on Friday. laying special focus on sanitation, the Minister said that the cleanliness target has to be achieved on time, adding that officers and employees observing an apathetic stance will be penalised.
He stressed that a special campaign should be undertaken for raising awareness on cleanliness. A complete prohibition should be enforced on defecation in the open for which stern measures including penalty should also be implemented. The individuals, institutions and departments doing good work in this sphere will be honoured on the birth anniversary of Pandit Deen Dayal Upadhyay on September 25 apart from which they will also be presented the cleanliness programme award. Reviewing the works of the urban development department, the minister said that in case of local bodies that fail to meet the targets for work progress, tax collection, door to door collection of garbage and other aspects, the quarterly finance provided to such local bodies from the state finance commission will be withheld except for salary disbursement. Regarding the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana, the officials concerned informed in the meeting that so far a total of 1,02,000 forms had been collected under the scheme. After verification and examination, these forms will be sent to the Central Government. Stress was also laid in the meeting on aspects like ease of doing business and online taxation system. Officials informed that so far 1768 GST Mitra had been registered for implementation of the Goods and Services Tax. Urban development secretary Radhika Jha, additional director Navneet Pandey, municipal commissioners and other officials concerned were also present in the meeting.