Chandigarh
This article has been sourced from an authoritative, official readers who wish to update or add further details can do so on a ‘Part II’ of this article. |
Contents |
The source of this article
INDIA 2012
A REFERENCE ANNUAL
Compiled by
RESEARCH, REFERENCE AND TRAINING DIVISION
PUBLICATIONS DIVISION
MINISTRY OF INFORMATION AND BROADCASTING
GOVERNMENT OF INDIA
Chandigarh
Area : 114 sq km
Population : 9,00,635 (Census 2001)
Capital : Chandigarh Languages : Hindi, Punjabi, English
HISTORY AND GEOGRAPHY
Chandigarh is a fully grown town of most modern architectural splendour. The city nestles in a picturesque setting in the foothills of Shivalik hills and enjoys the popular epithet the "City Beautiful". Representative of modern architecture and town planning, the city is a creation of the French Architect, Le Corbusier. Chandigarh and the area surrounding it were constituted as a Union Territory on 1 November 1966. It serves as the joint capital of both Punjab and Haryana States. It is bounded on north and west by Punjab and on the east and south by Haryana.
ADMINISTRATION
Chandigarh Administration is moving on four broad fronts. First, it is its aim to provide, with the help of information technology, an accessible and transparent administration. Chandigarh was among the earliest to implement the provisions of the Right to Information Act. A number of services, for which citizens earlier had to go to government offices, are now available on computer and mobile phones. All rules are being reviewed to see what simplification can be carried out to make them user-friendly. The purpose is to minimise the exercise of discretion, and minimise the leg-work of the citizen in dealing with the Administration.
Secondly, the Administration is working towards a higher rate of economic growth by encouraging economic activities which provide greater value addition, such as knowledge based industries, high-end commercial activity, etc. Chandigarh already has the highest per capita income in the country.
Thirdly, the Administration is seeking to provide infrastructural services such as electricity supply, water supply, health and educational services and public transport which should compare with those in advanced countries. Fourthly, the Administration is all too conscious of the fact that the benefits of development do not reach everyone equally. Hence there is a special emphasis on reaching out to those whom development has by-passed.
TRANSPORT
Chandigarh Administration comprehending the need for a user friendly transport system has decided to launch a Mass Rapid Transport System shortly. The UT Administration and the State Governments of Punjab and Haryana have come together for the implementation of the project.
CTU has computerized 70 per cent of its working and is in the process of further computerization. The Undertaking is also in the process of installing a Global Positioning System to monitor its fleet in a phased manner.
RURAL DEVELOPMENT
In order to sensitize the poor and weaker sections of the society about the rights and different benefits being extended to them by the State Legal Services Authority, 14 legal awareness seminars have already been organized in different villages of the UT.
Cement concrete paving and underground drains in village Kajheri and Palsora have been completed. 70 per cent work in village Mauli Jagran has been completed.
SPORTS
The Administration has opened a Girls Hockey Academy in sector-18 and would shortly start two more girls academies — one for Cricket and another for Football.
INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY
Construction work of Chandigarh Administration's visionary project Rajiv Gandhi Chandigarh Technology Park (RGCTP) is in full swing. Completion of Phase III will provide direct employment to 35000 professionals, thereby increasing the direct employment of RGCTP to 67,000 and would create 2,00,000 indirect jobs in Chandigarh. The Entrepreneur Development Centre at the RGCTP is being set up over an area of 1.5 acre approximately. The centre would become operational this year.
Chandigarh has become a role model in using information technology to provide fast and user friendly services for the masses. Under the E-Governance initiatives of the Department, seven more Gram Sampark Centres have been set up in the villages of Dhanas, Khudda Jassu, Kaimbwala, Raipur Khurd, Raipur Kalan, Makhan Majra and Bahlana. As many as seven more Gram Sampark Centres in villages Palsora, Dadu Majra, Hallo Majra, Khuda Alisher, Daria, Mauli Jagran and Maloya have been made operative.
In addition to the existing Centres some more Sampark Centres have been proposed and new services like payment of BSNL bills, power bills, water bills, payment of LIC premium, school fees collection and tubewell booking, especially for rural citizens , have also been incorporated or are being afoot.
The Administration is working on energy conservation. A Work order has been issued to the Tata BP Solar Ltd. for commissioning the State Level Energy Park at the Botanical Garden. Under the Solar Lighting initiative, all street lights in the villages would be replaced with solar based street lights.
SOCIAL WELFARE
Social Welfare has been a major focus of the Administration. Many peoplefriendly and innovative schemes for them have been launched by Administration. To wipe out the menace of casteism and encourage the people for inter-caste marriage, a sum of Rs. 5,000 was granted to the married couples provided that one of the spouses belongs to SC Community. Now the Administration has enhanced the amount to Rs. 50,000.
Under the Balika Samridhi Yojana, a sum of Rs. 500 is being given to the newly born girl child in the BPL families. The Chandigarh Administration has decided to set up a Preparatory School for Children with Special Needs (for 50 children) which will run in the premises of PRAYAS Building, Sector 38.
The Vocational Training Centre for Street Children in Maloya with the capacity to provide training for 900 children is under construction. The Administration has set up a child help line.
HEALTH
Telemedicine Project has been launched with the State-of-art facilities at Government Medical College and Hospital, Sector 32, Chandigarh aiming to help needy patients to avail the expert advice of the doctors of specialized fields in PGI and ensuring them high-quality medical services.
The Government Multi Speciality Hospital (GMSH), Sector 16 has been upgraded by adding a Trauma Unit having 28 beds with Emergency Operation Theatres.
The Administration has launched the project for improving the Monitorable Indicators of Reproductive and Child Health in UT at a cost of Rs. 5,273 per mother and her child.
Seven more "State-of-the-art" operation theatres including pre-anesthesia, postanesthesia rooms and a post operative ward have been commissioned in Government Medical College and Hospital, Chandigarh. "SAMARTH" a residential house for mentally retarded individuals had also been set up in Sector 15, Chandigarh. A total of around Rs. 5.6 crore has been sanctioned for the Residential Accommodation of the eligible faculty staff of GMCH.
INDUSTRIES
The Administration is developing the Phase-III of the Industrial Area at the revenue estate of village Mauli Jagran. 152 acres of land have been acquired.
EDUCATION
Chandigarh Administration is coming up with its World Class Project, the multi institutional 'Chandigarh Education City' at Sarangpur with a total area of 130 acres. Administration has enhanced the attendance scholarship being given to girl students of general category from Rs. 30 per month to Rs. 250 per month for a period for Classes 1st to 5th. For ensuring enrolment and education among scheduled caste boys and girls, Administration has also decided to increase the attendance scholarship being given to the Scheduled Castes students studying in Class 1st to 8th from Rs. 30 per month to Rs. 250 per month in the age group of 6 to 14 years. It has been decided to increase the scholarship to the meritorious SC/ST students of Classes 9th to 12th; it has been now increased to Rs. 300 per month whereas it was Rs. 20/- and Rs. 25/- earlier.
Chandigarh Administration has also decided to exempt the tuition fees of Muslims, Christians, Other Backward Classes, Handicapped, Ward of Freedom Fighters, Ex-serviceman, widows and divorcees having family income below Rs. 1.5 lakh per year. For the children belonging to low income groups and slum based families, it has decided to give incentive of Rs. 250 per month to rope in the children presently not enrolled in any school on their fresh enrolment.
TOURISM
Administration has taken many innovative and novel measures like Wedding Tourism. With the focus on extending efficient medical, educational and entertainment oriented facilities, Administration is promoting Cinematic Tourism, Sports Tourism and Medical Tourism in a big way. Chandigarh International Airport will prove to be a big leap for Tourism in the region.
POWER
Provision of sufficient electricity to all the residents of UT is also getting attention of the Administration. To improve the voltage profile and to reduce the load on the power distribution network of UT, the Electricity Wing had planned to add 80 MVAR Automatic Capacitor Banks at various existing 66KV Grid Sub-Stations located at different points in the periphery of UT.
Use of CFL has been made mandatory inside all government buildings. Similarly, all institutional buildings will have to provide solar lighting in their parking spaces within their complexes.
The Electricity Wing also achieved its target in reduction of transmission and distribution losses from 20.89% to 19.29%. The reduction is around 1.5%. Every effort is being made to reduce the losses further in the next year by another 1.5%.
MUNICIPAL CORPORATION
Municipal Corporation Chandigarh has upgraded the Sewage Treatment Plant at Diggian at a cost of Rs. 28 crore. MC also bagged the 1st prize both in water supply and sewage/drainage services from the Government of India, which was awarded by the Prime Minister of India.
A Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition System has been installed at a cost of Rs. 700 crore to keep surveillance and monitor the water supply. It will save power consumption, reduce operation and maintenance cost by approximately Rs. 3 crore annually.
To save potable water and provide additional water for landscaping, a project amounting to Rs.36 crore has been taken up. This project will generate 10 MGD tertiary water. The existing Dhobi Ghat of Sector 15 has been converted into Automatic Laundry Marts, the first of its kind in India.
Adding another milestone to up-gradation of the environment in City Beautiful, The Municipal Corporation has set up a Solid Waste Processing Plant at Dadu Majra at a cost of Rs. 30.00 crore on 10 acres. The plant is one of its kind in northern India.
GOVERNMENT
Administrator : Shri Shivraj V. Patil
Adviser to the Administrator
- Shri K.K. Sharma
Jurisdiction of High Court Falls under jurisdiction High Court of Punjab and Haryana
The idea of Chandigarh
The Times of India, Jun 09, 2016
Robin David
It's the only city in India where the streets have no (political) name
Isn't it ironical that Jawaharlal Nehru had some role to play in giving birth to India's only city which does not have a single road named after him or any member of his clan? In fact, except for a couple of aberrations, no street or publicly funded institution is named after any political leader in this city. As impossible as this may sound in the midst of the naming row that Rishi Kapoor sparked on Twitter, there is in fact such a city in India Chandigarh.
If you are driving to work in Chandigarh, you will not encounter Gandhi Road from where you reach Nehru Marg then drive past Netaji Subhash Chandra Chowk only to take the roundabout at Veer Savarkar Marg to finally reach your destination. Instead, you will take Udyan Path, get on to Dakshin Marg, drive up Jan Marg and turn at the Matka Chowk roundabout to reach your destination somewhere along the middle path Madhya Marg.
There are of course two exceptions to the rule, one of which found mention in Kapoor's tweets Nehru Hospital in the Post Graduate Institute of Medical Education and Research campus, and the Rajiv Gandhi Technology Park. All the same, it is difficult to think of another major city that has so few institutions named after politicians. No other city can afford to be as stingy. Even schools and colleges are not named after anyone, not even Mahatma Gandhi.
One can argue that it would be wrong to credit Nehru with giving Chandigarh its unique character. This city was, after all, the baby of the Swiss architect Le Corbusier who designed it from scratch and penned in 1959 the `Edict of Chandigarh' or guidelines for future citizens to follow and respect. Le Corbusier had clearly stated here that no one should be edified and in the process he was staying true to Nehru's idea of building a modern city without historical burdens. After Shimla was rejected as the new capital of Punjab post-Partition and a vast plateau 240 km north of Delhi was identified to build Chandigarh, Nehru had said that the site was free of the existing encumbrances of old towns and old traditions. “Let it be the first large expression of our creative genius flowering on our newly earned freedom,“ he had added.
In the book `Le Corbusier: A life', the author Nicolas Fox Weber writes that a fresh start requiring an unprecedented solution was a Corbusean ideal. “The complete societal and historical change that underlay the new project now thrilled Le Corbusier,“ Weber writes. “More than six million Muslims had left India to move to Pakistan, while some seven and a half million Hindus and Sikhs had moved across the new border into India. Ever since Punjab had lost its beautiful, romantic Lahore to Pakistan, the new capital was urgently needed to administer a state that, from the start, had major problems deriving from the influx of refugees. Those tensions and necessities required him to build a brave new world. Architecture had to fulfill a burning human purpose well beyond the basics of housing.“
Thus, you have the Edict of Chandigarh, a document with no legal sanctity but one that merges philosophy with town planning to give ten clear commandments. On the one hand, it gives mundane details like how roads and sectors should be laid out and on the other talks about the importance of the human scale. The ninth commandment reads: “The age of personal statues is gone. No personal statues shall be erected in the city or parks of Chandigarh. The city is planned to breathe the new sublimated spirit of art. Commemoration of persons shall be confined to suitably placed bronze plaques.“
It is this directive that gives birth to names like Himalaya Marg and Uttar Path and Vidya Path ... As a result, Chandigarh is perhaps the only city in India with an abstract sculpture a massive distorted open palm made of metal sheets that rotates in the wind as its emblem. This again was designed by Le Corbusier as a symbol of peace and reconciliation the hand is open to give and to receive.
Some residents have even criticised the city's almost banal character, suggesting that there should be some landmarks that every roundabout can't be the same as the one before it.This had led the authorities in 2013 to consider having some defining landmarks in the master plan, but in a way that doesn't affect the city's overall character.
Why has Chandigarh remained this way? There are no clear answers but it is believed that because it is a union territory with comparatively less interference from politicians and because bureaucrats love a status quo, the Edict has thus far been largely respected.
But imagine. Le Corbusier said the age of personal statues was over almost 60 years ago while designing a city for us even as we squabble over names today .Perhaps the visionary architect did not realise during his brief stay here that we Indians don't live our lives in a linear progression. Nothing for us is over forever. Everything comes around in an unending cycle. And so, it is quite likely that we will keep fighting over Akbar Road and Aurangzeb Road and Abdul Kalam Road in the future as well even as farmers turn suicide into an epidemic and the world boils up like a tandoor.
Hopefully , the idea of Chandigarh will survive all this.
