Udupi: Udupi Zilla Panchayat president Dinakar Babu on Wednesday directed officers to complete all drinking water works under the Department of Rural Drinking Water and Sanitation by the end of March. He was presiding over the monthly Karnataka Development Programme at the Zilla Panchayat Hall here.
Mr. Babu said that the officers should make all efforts to provide drinking water to people. There were complaints of leakage from the gates on the vented dams in some places, including Kaduhole-Kadtala near Karkala. The Department of Minor Irrigation should take immediate steps to plug the leakages, he said.
The tax revision exercise had been completed in all gram panchayats (GPs) in the district. All the gram panchayats should collected the revised taxes and reach the targets given to them by the end of March. Executive Officers of all taluk panchayats should ensure that this was done, he said.
Mr. Babu said that the construction of houses under the rural housing schemes was affected due to lack of sand in the district. An officer from the Department of Mines and Geology told the meeting that a total of 21 sand blocks in the non-Coastal Regulation Zone (CRZ) areas had been allocated to the Public Works Department, the Nirmiti Kendra, the Karnataka Rural Infrastructure Development Ltd., the Panchayat Raj Engineering Division and different government agencies for removal of excess sand.
Excess sand
The Karnataka State Coastal Zone Management Authority had given its approval to removal of excess sand from seven sand bars in the CRZ areas.
There was 7,96,522 tonnes of excess sand which could be removed in the CRZ areas. A seven-member District Sand Monitoring Committee would soon distribute the bars, the officer said.
The progress of work under Special Component Plan and Tribal Sub Plan was slow and action would be taken against the officers concerned, said Sindhu B. Rupesh, Chief Executive Officer of the Zilla Panchayat.
Ramarao, officer from the Department of Health and Family Welfare, said that so far there had been no cases of human beings affected by Kyasanur Forest Disease in the district. Banners had been put up asking tourists not to visit areas where there was high density of monkeys. Awareness activities had been taken up across the district, he said.
Chief Planning Officer Srinivas Rao directed the officers to see to it that twin pit toilets were constructed in houses which did not have toilets in rural areas.
Zilla Panchayat Vice-President Sheela K. Shetty was present.