Comprehensive plan to transform all cities, towns: Sidhu

Chandigarh: Punjab minister Navjot Singh Sidhu on Wednesday said his government has chalked out a comprehensive plan to transform all the cities and towns of the state.

He said necessary funds were being arranged and released for development of cities.

No stone will be left unturned to develop the cities under the leadership of the Chief Minister, Punjab, Captain Amarinder Singh, he said.

The state local government minister said funds to the tune of Rs 2,127 crore have been approved for the development of the cities and that these will be released soon.

Sidhu alleged that the previous regime had approved Rs 2,054.05 crore for 122 cities, out of which only Rs 567.60 crore were released in December, 2016.

He said the developmental works pertaining to the cities were stalled owing to the non-release of funds, adding the present government was releasing rest of the Rs 1,540 crore amount.

He said the Congress-led state government had decided to review the works done during its six months tenure.

Under the urban mission, Rs 587 crore have been approved for the cities, he said.

On developmental works for corporation cities, Sidhu said Rs 139 crore and Rs 125 crore have been approved for the development of Ludhiana and Amritsar, respectively, while the amount for Jalandhar and Patiala would be approved soon. He said the 'kaptaan e-Sewa' was being initialised under which procuring of all kinds of maps including those of houses through online mode would be started.