Gogoi directs GMDA to implement land, water resource mgt project

He said the govt would now make available the requisite capital for completion of the pilot project

Assam Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi today asked the Guwahati Metropolitan Development Authority (GMDA) to implement suggestions given way back in 2008 in a report by the IIT-Guwahati regarding land and water resource management.

According to an official release, Gogoi directed the GMDA to take necessary steps to implement the pilot project 'Integrated Land use Planning and Water Resource Management', based on a project report submitted by Arup Kumar Sarma from IIT-Guwahati to the Urban Development Department in 2008.

The Chief Minister accepted that the project could not make much headway owing to fund constraints, but the government would now make available the requisite capital for completion of the pilot project, the release said.

Earlier, the government had formed a Technical Core Committee comprising secretary level officials with Sarma as its coordinator in 2009.

The process of physical survey started in 2010 and on its completion, a Pilot Project Implementation Committee was formed headed by Additional Chief Secretary Subhash Chandra Das on June 11, 2013.

It may be mentioned here that Sarma had prepared a project - Flood Hazard Mitigation of Guwahati city through Silt Monitoring and Watershed Management - during the period from 2001 to 2004 and submitted it to the Soil Conservation Department in 2005.

The detailed project was submitted to the UD department, which renamed the project as 'Integrated land use Planning and Water Resource Management' in 2008.