Govt to grant online nod to dig roads for water, sewer projects

The process of laying underground water and sewer lines and electric and optical fibre cables will be expedited in the national Capital as the Delhi government has decided to grant permission to dig and cut the roads online.

The Delhi Cabinet has given the go-ahead for developing a system to give online permission for road cutting to be executed on the Public Works Department (PWD) roads. 

In March this year, Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal had announced that his government would fulfil the goal of supplying piped water to all households in the city by 2017. The online system will ensure quick approval from the PWD for digging its roads for laying water pipelines, execution of repair works and others.

Public Works Minister Satyendra Jain said through the online system the departments concerned, including municipal corporations, would be able to get the permission to dig roads and carry out the projects within a few days of applying.

“As of now, the departments concerned have to wait for several months to get the PWD’s permission to carry out road cutting work. In view of this, we will soon launch an online system, under which the agencies concerned will be given online permission to cut roads by the department,” Jain said.

A senior government official said due to delay in securing permission some agencies did not apply for it and went ahead with digging the roads with PWD not even getting to know of their “illegal work”.

“In the next three-four days, the online system will come into existence and thereafter departments will not have to wait for months for road cutting,” the official said.