₹300 cr. for Namakku Naame scheme, more electric crematoria.

Municipal Administration Minister K.N. Nehru recently announced an allocation of ₹300 crore for the Namakku Naame scheme. Under the scheme, waterbodies will be restored in all Municipal Corporations, including the Greater Chennai Corporation, and new parks will be set up. “We will create entertainment and sports facilities, plant trees, upgrade schools, set up health and learning centres, lay roads and arrange streetlights,” Mr. Nehru said in the Assembly.

He told the Assembly that 2,220 battery-run vehicles would be purchased in the next two years to reduce the burden of sanitation workers in town panchayats, who have been using push carts to collect solid waste. A total of 1,494 battery-run vehicles at a cost of ₹35 crore will be purchased in the current year.

The Minister said it was the government’s goal to establish one electric crematorium in all urban local bodies. In the current year, 75 crematoria will be converted into electric at a cost of ₹112 crore.

In the Greater Chennai Corporation, 10 crematoria would be upgraded at a cost of ₹15 crore.

Mr. Nehru said the Victoria Memorial would be decorated with lights. “Fifty parks, including the Royapuram bridge park in Chennai, will be upgraded at a cost of ₹50 crore. The Ripon Buildings will be decorated with lights at a cost of ₹2.75 crore,” he said.

THE HINDU