JOIN USA cell is proposed to be set up in the office of Lieutenant Governor Najeeb Jung to monitor and hasten the implementation of a slew of populist schemes announced for the city in the Union Budget.
According to sources, the suggestion on the cell has come at a time when the BJP-led central government and the party’s Delhi unit are betting big on showcasing these welfare schemes and development works to win over voters in the possible Assembly elections – expected early next year.
The officials of the project implement cell are likely to be tasked to ensure the timely implementation – in most cases by December – of the projects such as water ATMs and water and power supply augmentation in unauthorised colonies.
The cell, proposed to have officials from works, finance and revenue departments,
is being seen as a one-stop unit for ironing out delays in the tender process, land acquisition and finance approvals related to development projects.
Sources said the new cell would help the city administration kick start time-consuming projects like construction of schools, hospitals, working women’s hostels, dialysis centres for kidney patients and medical and architecture colleges.
Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, in his Delhi Budget speech, had announced the plan to start work on at least 20 schools, seven working women’s hostels, a hospital and medical college in Ambedkar Nagar and 50 dialysis units under the public-private participation mode.
Purchase of around 1,380 semi-low floor buses for the Delhi Transport Corporation, optimal utilisation of the Bawana power plant and renovation of sewage treatment plants to check Yamuna pollution also have been enlisted as the priorities for the proposed cell.
Most of the members of the cell would be drawn from the city administration and sent on deputation to the cell.
Sources said the Delhi Budget would get approved by parliament by the month-end and the home ministry in the BJP-led central government wants Jung and his team to get cracking on project implementation soon after.
Delhi BJP chief Satish Upadhyay has also instructed his party leaders to educate people about the public welfare and development projects proposed by the central government for Delhi in the Budget.
Assembly elections
Party sources claimed fresh Assembly elections could be held around February next year and for that the model code of conduct would come in force in early January, effectively leaving time till December for Jung and city officials to show results on the Budget projects.
“Implementation of the Delhi Budget proposals in the next six months – before the poll code kicks in – will hold the key to the BJP’s success in the Assembly election,” said a BJP legislator, adding that he and his colleagues were trying to spend their constituency development fund as fast as possible.