Three years after its formation, GMDA is now set for an overhaul

Gurgaon: Better late than never. Three years after its incorporation, GMDA is all set for restructuring in order to achieve better coordination and efficiency levels between its verticals. Officials said a central body on the lines of a thinktank will be formed internally to conceptualise projects and act as a link between different wings.
Ironically, GMDA was constituted to improve the coordination among the different government bodies in Gurgaon to cut down the multiplicity of authorities. However, it is now struggling to ensure communication and coordination within its own departments. GMDA currently has divisional heads but there is little coordination and communication between the wings under them.
GMDA chief VS Kundu said that the internal restructuring process has already been underway for a couple of months now and “it is largely aimed at improving the communication between the departments”.
GMDA currently has two separate infrastructure wings (wet infrastructure and dry infrastructure), environment wing, urban planning wing, a smart city division and a mobility division, and they all have a divisional head. It also has a GIS division, in addition to the smart city division.
“If one division is undertaking a road improvement project, it is important that the other departments are kept in the loop as there are other utilities and green belts that might need consideration. And this needs proper communication between the two wings,” said Kundu.
Sources within GMDA said that issues were cropping up time and again as the departments within the metropolitan authority were working in silos without any coordination. “We have several big projects coming up in the city such as metro and medical college, and we cannot undertake these projects without communication between our own teams,” said a senior GMDA official on condition of anonymity .
GMDA currently also has five additional CEOs, whereas the GMDA Act mentions only one additional CEO. When asked about the same, Kundu said, “One additional CEO is not sufficient for the body and it might require an amendment in the regulations in the long run for the required changes.”
Even outside, GMDA has not been able to cut down on the chaos ensued due to the multiple authorities in the city, including MCG, NHAI, HSIIDC and HSVP. In October last year, GMDA had, in fact, found itself in the middle of a legal tussle when a company moved the court against HSVP for cancelling the allotment of a parking lot in Sector 29. The land, which had been allotted by HSVP, actually belonged to GMDA.
In another similar case, MCG installed water ATMs across the city at multiple locations and roped in an agency to take up the job. However, months later, GMDA realised that all these ATMs had been installed on their land and hence they had them removed, putting to waste all the effort and investments made by the corporation. Even GMDA and NHAI have had issues over drainage problems in the city.