Slum dwellings in Pimpri Chinchwad to get digital address; survey launched to upgrade basic amenities

Pratima Joshi of Shelter Associates said, “Google Plus code is generated in the Google Plus code software…”

pimpri chinchwad slums, address, google, pune news, indian express

The survey has been launched by the PCMC with the help of NGO Shelter Associates, which has already provided Google Plus codes in several slums in Kolhapur and a few in Pune city. (Representational Photo)

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The Pimpri-Chinchwad Municipal Corporation (PCMC) Tuesday launched a survey in eight slums under its jurisdiction with an aim to provide a ‘Plus Code’ to every dwelling. A ‘Plus Code’, developed by Google, is a digital address based on latitude and longitude and displayed as letters and numbers.

Additional Municipal Commissioner Ulhas Jagtap inaugurated the survey at Gawli Matha slum near Nehrunagar. The eight slums are located in Akurdi, Bhosari, Pimpri and Dapodi areas.

The PCMC will initially put up a board with a ‘Plus Code’ outside each hutment and shop in the eight slums. And then, the exercise will be carried out in all PCMC slums, civic officials said.

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“The survey will help us understand the status of basic services being provided in the slums by the civic body and other related details like availability of water, roads, drainage, and toilets for individual huts. After this, we plan to provide each hutment with a Google Plus code. The code will help us identify the exact location of the hutment and the needs of the family staying there,” PCMC Deputy Municipal Commissioner Anna Bodade told Indian Express Wednesday.

Bodade said though the PCMC is currently in the process of rehabilitating slum dwellers by constructing high-rise buildings, the civic administration at the same time is determined to ensure that basic services are upgraded in the slums.

“Slum rehabilitation is a continuous process. It is happening and will take time. Before that, we cannot allow slums to remain in the state they are in. And, therefore, the civic administration is going all out to ensure effective implementation of basic services for slum dwellers,” he added.

The survey has been launched by the PCMC with the help of NGO Shelter Associates, which has already provided Google Plus codes in several slums in Kolhapur and a few in Pune city.

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Pratima Joshi of Shelter Associates said, “Google Plus code is generated in the Google Plus code software…”

Joshi added that the code will help residents avail services like cylinder delivery or emergency ambulance service at their doorstep. The code will also be highly beneficial to the PCMC. “If a drain is overflowing in front of a hutment, the resident living there can alert the PCMC by putting the code in Google Maps. The officials can then locate the exact hutment.”

During the Covid-19 pandemic, Joshi said, they had given a Plus Code to each dwelling in Kolhapur slums. “This helped us in finding out the status of vaccination among slum dwellers,” she said.

Manoj Dattatrye More

Manoj More has been working with the Indian Express since 1992. For the first 16 years, he worked on the desk, edited stories, made pages, wrote special stories and handled The Indian Express edition. In 31 years of his career, he has regularly written stories on a range of topics, primarily on civic issues like state of roads, choked drains, garbage problems, inadequate transport facilities and the like. He has also written aggressively on local gondaism. He has primarily written civic stories from Pimpri-Chinchwad, Khadki, Maval and some parts of Pune. He has also covered stories from Kolhapur, Satara, Solapur, Sangli, Ahmednagar and Latur. He has had maximum impact stories from Pimpri-Chinchwad industrial city which he has covered extensively for the last three decades. Manoj More has written over 20,000 stories. 10,000 of which are byline stories. Most of the stories pertain to civic issues and political ones. The biggest achievement of his career is getting a nearly two kilometre road done on Pune-Mumbai highway in Khadki in 2006. He wrote stories on the state of roads since 1997. In 10 years, nearly 200 two-wheeler riders had died in accidents due to the pathetic state of the road. The local cantonment board could not get the road redone as it lacked funds. The then PMC commissioner Pravin Pardeshi took the initiative, went out of his way and made the Khadki road by spending Rs 23 crore from JNNURM Funds. In the next 10 years after the road was made by the PMC, less than 10 citizens had died, effectively saving more than 100 lives. Manoj More's campaign against tree cutting on Pune-Mumbai highway in 1999 and Pune-Nashik highway in 2004 saved 2000 trees. During Covid, over 50 doctors were asked to pay Rs 30 lakh each for getting a job with PCMC. The PCMC administration alerted Manoj More who did a story on the subject, asking then corporators how much money they demanded....The story worked as doctors got the job without paying a single paisa. Manoj More has also covered the "Latur drought" situation in 2015 when a "Latur water train" created quite a buzz in Maharashtra. He also covered the Malin tragedy where over 150 villagers had died. Manoj More is on Facebook with 4.9k followers (Manoj More), on twitter manojmore91982 ... Read More

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