Waterlogging woes: Chief Secretary has to appear, says HC

Delhi High Court today refused to exempt Delhi's Chief Secretary from appearing in person on April 23 in connection with delay in filing a report on proposed short and long term measures to tackle the issue of water logging in the national capital.
"No. You (Delhi government) are not getting the point. The purpose behind calling the Chief Secretary is no one can refuse him," a bench of Chief Justice G Rohini and Justice Pradeep Nandrajog said in response to city government's plea to let some other senior officer appear before the court.
The court also said that as per the panel which was to make the report, none of the government departments were cooperating with it by providing the data, maps and other details.

It also said that the report which had to be filed on March 26, 2014, as per its order of October 29, 2013 was filed on April 16 after it had sought presence of the Chief Secretary.
Seeking exemption from personal appearance of the Chief Secretary, Delhi government said there was delay in filing the status report due to confusion as to whether the panel headed by Professor A K Gosain of IIT Delhi or the Urban Development (UD) department will file it.
The UD department was not informed by the panel as to whether it would be filing the status report on its own or not, the government said in its interim application seeking exemption from personal appearance of the Chief Secretary.

The panel in its report, submitted on April 16, has said that "present drainage" should be "de-silted" as one of the short term measures to tackle the woes of water logging.
It, however, said that so far no long term measures have been devised by the panel.