GIS project: GHMC to seek professional help

The Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) has decided to seek the help of professional technocrats to complete its Geographical Information System (GIS) project.

A full time project leader and a part-time consultant are being recruited to take the project to its logical end besides verifying data collected and maps done by the six private agencies.A seven-member committee has been formed to select them and it has the Additional Commissioners of IT, Planning, Works and Finance.

Three outside experts from A.P. Forest Department, Hyderabad Metropolitan Water Supply and Sewerage Board (HMWSSB) and the Andhra Pradesh State Remote Sensing Application Centre (APSRAC) too have been drafted into the panel.

Taking professionals became imperative as GHMC’s own GIS cell has failed to do the job.

An internal note submitted to the Commissioner and Special Officer C.V.S.K. Sarma has pinpointed how the cell headed by a Chief Information Officer (now moved out) has blundered.

Damning report
“Nothing worthwhile has been delivered by them implies that the cell is in a perpetual hibernation and they are being paid wages for non-performance,” said the report in a damning indictment.

Arguing for reviving the project, the note said that there was “no regular and focused monitoring visible at any stage.”

“The contractors have been left free for themselves and we did not care to validate the data submitted” in July-Sept 2007.

The private agencies “should have completed the work in four months (December 2006) but till date no extension was given to them,” it further stated. Recalling that agency for ex-circle four had ‘vanished’, it said that “no efforts were made to penalise him” or another agency found. “We have been functioning as if there are only six circles and circle four had vanished!”

‘Common thread’
“GIS and IT are the common thread binding all sections of GHMC and mostly used by taxation, town planning and engineering sections. An officer with commitment…may be kept in charge of both initiatives in the interests” of the corporation, it added.

Inexplicably, the officer heading the GIS cell had been allowed to go scot-free, despite this indicting report, thanks to the benevolence of the top boss.