Chief Minister handed over his dream project

It is back to work for Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav. And on the first day in office after hectic over 50-day election campaign Chief Minister handed over his dream project of green expressway connecting Agra to lucknow to Navneet Sehgal, the man who was once considered blue-eyed boy of Mayawati.

Sources in the Government told The Pioneer that Sehgal has been made CEO of UP Expressway Industrial Development Authority (UPEIDA) in place of Mukul Singhal. Sehgal took charge on Monday and on Wednesday he met Chief Minister to get directives from him on this project.Sehgal was secretary to Chief Minister during Mayawati’s tenure and was heading important departments including power in that regime. With the change in Government Sehgal was shunted out to non-existent department like Religious Endowment which looked only after Vishwanath Temple in Varanasi.

After Samajwadi Party Government got a bad press post-Muzaffarnagar riots, Chief Minister made Sehgal as principal secretary, Information, giving signals of his revival and after the Agra-lucknow Expressway hit the roadblock Government shunted out Singhal and brought in Sehgal.“Chief Minister wanted a go getter type officer who could complete the Agra-lucknow project in the stipulated time. So he opted for Sehgal,” a senior official in CM’s office told The Pioneer here on Wednesday.

The Green Expressway has hit the road block after it failed to get positive response on the PPP model. When no private investor showed interest in this scheme the Government decided to finance the project. This expressway is divided in five packages and its Request for Quotation (RFQ) have been received by due date which was April 22.and these have been kept unopened, the official said “Chief Minister held a series of meeting with the officials and took stock of the pending schemes. The CM also informed officials about the feedback he had received from the party workers during his election campaign. He asked the officials to improve the delivery system,” sources said.