Officials gear up for 60-day action plan in Warangal

Warangal: It's high time that all the Gram Panchayats have to gear up for the '60-day action plan' for developing greenery and hygiene in villages, Warangal Urban District Collector Prashanth Jeevan Patil said. Chairing a review meet on the implementation of 60-day action plan here on Friday, he dwelt at length about the progressive works such as community toilets, dumping yards, graveyards etc being taken up by the administration.

"The MPDOs, mandal special officers and panchayat secretaries need to get well versed with the new Panchayat Raj Act. The administration will conduct an objective test for the panchayat secretaries to assess their knowledge about the duties and responsibilities of the sarpanches and upa-sarpanches," the Collector said. The test is likely to be conducted on August 30.

The panchayat secretaries will have to secure 50 per cent marks so that they can avail their annual increment. On the other hand, the regularisation of the junior panchayat secretaries who were appointed recently services is also dependent on this objective mode test, Patil said. The test in new Panchayat Raj act is to assess the knowledge of the MPDOs, he added.

The Collector said that in accordance with the new Panchayat Raj Act-2018 each gram panchayat will have to elect three co-option members before August 29. Likewise, a standing committee each to i) oversee sanitation, dumping yards and graveyards; ii) street lighting; iii) plantation and greenery; iv) works and weekly shanties. Each standing committee would have 15 members with one of them as is convener. The Collector said that Gram Panchayats have to convene a special meeting to appoint the cooption members and standing committees.

"The onus is such that MPDOs and the special officers are like two eyes of the new Panchayat Raj," Patil said. He directed the officials to complete the works of community toilets before the end of September. Of the 88 dumping yards, construction of 47 is complete, he added.

He instructed the MPDOs to speed up the works of graveyards in 72 panchayats. Zilla Parishad CEO Prasoona Rani, DRDO T Ramu and Panchayat Officer Mahmood were among others present.