NEW DELHI: Delhi Minister Gopal Rai on Friday approved 100 new schemes, including roads, drains, and playgrounds, worth Rs 93 crores to boost village development, a statement said.
Rai chaired a meeting of the Gram Vikas Board at the Delhi Secretariat here on Friday. The board approved 100 schemes to ensure development in the capital’s villages.
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The Gram Vikas Board has approved the installation of 100 benches in bigger villages, the statement said.
These include development works related to roads, drains, water bodies, community centers, parks, crematoriums, and playgrounds. The projects will be carried out in Delhi’s rural areas at a cost of Rs 93 crore, it said, adding that they aim to improve amenities across all villages in Delhi.
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Foot march
The residents of Delhi’s villages are planning a foot march starting on October 13 to raise their voices against the long-pending issues in the city’s rural belt. The proposed “Gaon Dehat Bachao Yatra” is expected to reach every village in Delhi, discuss the problems of the people on the ground in the rural belt, and bring them together against issues.
The village representatives, who will be led by Sakal Panchayat Palam 360 chief Chaudhary Surender Solanki, have warned that they may decide to boycott the elections if their problems are not addressed before the upcoming Delhi Assembly polls.
“On October 6, scores of people coming from the city’s villages had gathered at Jantar Mantar for an indefinite protest against a number of unresolved problems of the city’s rural areas, and the police removed them towards the evening on the same day,” Solanki alleged while speaking to this newspaper.
He said that the city’s villages have been neglected, and now their situation has become worse, almost like slums, lacking basic infrastructure, poor sanitation, broken roads and drains, forcing people to live in miserable conditions.
Delhi has over 360 underdeveloped villages, which have received cursory attention compared to urban areas.
As per locals, they are confined in cramped and unhealthy pockets by the Lal Dora (Red Line) which has reduced them to living in inhuman conditions lacking in basic civic services such as water, power, healthcare and good education.
What is even more alarming is that these villages are not under any ward or rural panchayat, which leaves the fate of the villagers in a pitiful state.
Solanki said that governments have been giving assurances, but on the ground, the issues remain mostly unaddressed, apart from a few.
“Our movement isn’t against any party, but against those who neglect the problems faced by the villages,” the Khap Panchayat chief said.
Poll boycott threat
The residents of Delhi’s villages are planning a foot march starting on October 13 to raise their voices against the long-pending issues in the city’s rural belt. The village representatives, who will be led by Sakal Panchayat Palam 360 chief Chaudhary Surender Solanki, have warned that they may decide to boycott the elections if their problems are not addressed before the upcoming Delhi Assembly polls.
