Two-day special training programme on ‘Urban Governance at Kargil’ organised by the Housing & Urban Development Department, Ladakh in collaboration with the Centre for Urban Studies of the Indian Institute of Public Administration (IIPA), New Delhi was inaugurated on June 21.

Administrator, Municipal Committee (MC), Kargil and Joint Director, Information, Ladakh, Imteeaz Kacho (JKAS) thanked the team of IIPA for organizing the vital and much-needed training programme which was expected to be a knowledge-gaining experience for the participants and would go on to further guide MC-Kargil’s staff towards effective development and management of the thirteen (13) Wards of Kargil Town.

Kacho highlighted the challenges that MC-Kargil has been facing vis-vis urban planning and development. He asserted that development of Kargil Town needs to be done in a phased and wholistic manner while keeping sustainability in mind. He added that expansion of boundaries of MC-Kargil is under consideration. 

While highlighting the activities, the Administrator MC-Kargil talked about the upcoming mega projects like the modern slaughter house, the truck terminal and the waste treatment plant as well as the sewage treatment plants. 

Kacho also informed the gathering that he and Administrator,MC-Leh had attended a four-day workshop in Indian Institute of Management, Indore (M.P.) earlier this year and saw how waste segregation, door-to-door waste collection, scientific waste processing, scientific landfill processes, plastic waste management, transformation waste-to-energy are undertaken in the Cleanest City of India and realized how they can be replicated in Kargil at lower scale to start with and how bio-CNG plants operate.

Further, he expressed hope that the participants of the training programme will benefit from all the sessions and get positively enlightened about concepts like demand management (rather than supply management), water budgeting, water reuse, circular economy and various aspects of waste management, community participation, convergence in planning service delivery and urban governance.

Programme Coordinator and Associate Professor IIPA, Dr. Kusum Lata said that by 2047, India will be aiming to become a developed country and to achieve that there is a need to provide services in urban areas for which efficient urban governance is necessary.

The Programme Coordinator thanked the Union Territory Administration of Ladakh for arranging the workshops both in Kargil and Leh.

On the first day of the training, special sessions were conducted on themes including urban governance, role for funds, functionaries and finances, circular economy and service delivery.