The State Government on Tuesday held a preliminary meeting for creation of an Odisha Capital Regional Development Authority (OCRDA) with the merger of three major development authorities, Bhubaneswar Development Authority (BDA), Cuttack Development Authority (CDA) and Puri-Konark Development Authority (PKDA), which are located close to each other.
The three development authorities are to be clubbed into a single entity on the lines of the Mumbai Metropolitan Regional Development Authority and Delhi Metropolitan Development Authority. The mandate of the body would be regional planning with no routine work in its kitty.
“This was a preliminary meeting, and we will hold several meetings before the move takes shape. The regional body would work for infrastructure development, besides land issues,” said Panchayati Raj Secretary Deoranjan Singh, who is also in charge of the Housing and Urban Development Department. The meeting was chaired by the Development Commissioner and attended by BDA, CDA and H&UD Department officials.
It may be recalled that IIT Kharagpur had recommended creation of a regional authority for development of the three places. Under the Odisha Technology Mission, the State had initiated a proposal for a development plan and assigned the task of preparing a Perspective Plan Vision 2030 and Comprehensive Development Plan for Bhubaneswar-Cuttack Urban Complex to the IIT Kharagpur’s department of architecture and regional planning.
The long-term perspective plan envisages an investment of Rs 29,560 crore in sectors like traffic and transportation, housing, physical infrastructure, social infrastructure, tourism and heritage. Of this, Rs 15,000 crore would be public investment.
Since the Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission mandates the municipal bodies be vested with regular powers such as permissions for building plan approval as part of the reforms, the Government wants to free the BDA, CDA and PKDA of such routine activities.
The authority would help meet the housing target for Bhubaneswar, which would need around 4.4 lakh houses for its expected population of 30 lakh by 2030. The requirement of drinking water would be an estimated 88 million gallons per day.
The rapid mass transit system, improvement of roads, construction of parking space and open space to cater to the burgeoning population of the city requires huge investment that would be solved through the authority, said an H&UD official.