ISlAMABAD - The Capital Development Authority is going to organise its own Islamabad literature Festival during 17-19 March 2023, it was informed by the Chief Commissioner Islamabad and Chairman CDA Captain Noor ul Amin Mengal on Wednesday.
He was speaking to journalists at the conference room of CDA in an introductory session where he informed that the authority has decided to organise the literature festival by its own instead of sponsoring to any private firm or forum.
He informed a committee comprising former Chairman CDA Kamran lashari, former Principal Secretary to the Prime Minister Fawad Hassan Fawad, Adeel Hashmi and Member Environment CDA has been constituted. He said two venues are under consideration for this event and it will be organised at Pak-China Friendship Centre or at the F-9 Park. Noor ul Amin Mengal said that he is paying special focus over the development of sectors and directed the concerned formations to at least start handing over of possession to the allotees where development has been completed instead of waiting for the development of an entire sector.
He said we are going to hand over possession in sector I-15 in this month while soon it will be handed over into sector E-12. Defending a decision taken at the prime minister level to uplift the rural areas of the city by CDA, he said it is also a part of Islamabad.
He informed that a PC-I worth Rs10 billion has been prepared under which multiple development works would be carried out in the rural areas. He said we don’t have an issue of the funding as we are earning a handsome amount by auctioning commercial plots and the same would be spent on the people of this city. Chairman CDA also said that they are going to introduce a new model in which the private sector is given facilitation to run different public service projects on lease basis and we will do our role as facilitator alone.
It is pertinent to mention here that earlier CDA was unable to do any joint venture but recently the government had made some changes into the authority’s act –enabling it to do joint venture projects. Talking about the structural reforms in the civic authority, he said he has directed to create three independent agencies including Solid Waste Management Agency, Building Control Authority and Parks and Horticulture Authority like rest of the cities in the country for better service delivery.
He said unfortunately the civic authority has been dependent on the auction of plots alone since its creation but now we have created a dedicated post of member resources to explore other avenues and streamline the revenue section. He said the uplifting of the capital’s parks and mass transit system is my priority and promised that he will change the outlook of parks in the city, whereas, he said we have already signed an agreement to ply buses on 17 feeder routes.