'Separate authority for development of city, dist'

He was speaking at the foundation stone laying ceremony of ‘Heritage Zone Development’ projects being taken up jointly by Mysore City Corporation (MCC) and Karnataka Tourism Department  under the Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission (JnNURM), here on Monday.

Indicating that the several existing authorities would be brought under one umbrella organisation, Ramdas opined that it would help in overall development of the city and district.

Underlining the importance of maintaining beauty and cleanliness of the city, he said that plans are afoot to create a biogas plant to generate gas from the waste collected at Devaraja Market. He said the gas generated would be supplied to K R Hospital for providing hot water to patients. At the same time, it would help keep the city clean, he added.

Advocating the need to shift the City Bus Stand, Ramdas said that the decision would be taken after holding discussions with various quarters of the society. He also urged for making the heart of the city ‘smoke free’. He stressed on creating parking lots near K R Hospital and Sri Chamarajendra Zoological Gardens.

MCC Commissioner K S Raykar said that the projects have been divided into four packages. Under the first package roads surrounding the Amba Vilas Palace would be developed at a cost of ` 16.73 crore. The second package would include construction of 20 buildings in various parts of the city for housing sarots and tongas at a cost of ` 2.23 crore.

The third package is aimed at constructing an two-levels of underground parking facility at the Town Hall premises and construction of an ‘Open air theatre’, which will be capable to seating 1,000 persons. The Town Hall would be renovated at a cost of `2.83 crore under the fourth package.

He said that contractors have been given a timeline of one year to complete all the work.

This for the first time that MCC is officially constructing a parking lot. He said that people parking their vehicles at Town Hall would be able to use 10 battery operated vehicles to commute to Amba Vilas Palace and Zoo. He said that even though plans underway to shift the City Bus Stand to the Mofussil Bus Stand, there is stiff opposition. Meanwhile, CBS was also renovated causing the shifting to be postponed by five years.

Mayor Pushpalatha T B Chikkanna, JnNURM Superintendent Engineer Suresh Babu, Zoo Authority of Karnataka Chairman M Nanjundaswamy, Karnataka Exhibition Authority Chairman B P Manjunath, councillors M K Shankar, Ninganna, Pradeep, Pushpalatha Jagannath, Mahadevamma, Ratnamma, A V Vidya, Sunandakumar, Nandakumar, Shivakumar, M V Ramprasad and Jayashankaraswamy were present.

Town Hall to be closed for a year
The Town Hall will remain closed for one year due to the renovation work. The renovated premises will be air conditioned and have new seating arrangements. MCC Commissioner K S Raykar said that nominal fee hike would be fixed once the Town Hall is renovated.