The state government’s notification of merging 23 villages in Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) limit has suddenly put the gram panchayat office-bearers into crowd management. Their offices are suddenly packed as the government has given just a month’s time to complete property registrations. Now, the gram panchayats are working towards methods of avoiding crowding.
Some gram panchayats have introduced token systems to manage the crowd. Some have scheduled appointments — only those with the pre-confirmations are allowed to enter the offices.
The gram panchayat of Wagholi, set to be included in the PMC limit, is one afflicted with crowding. They have started a token system. Wagholi’s deputy sarpanch Sandeep Satav said, “As the state government has given one month to complete this registration, there is a sudden rush. If there was no COVID-19, we would have set up additional counters. The only way now is to introduce a token system to reduce the crowd.”
The people coming to the office for registration are given tokens, the numbers on which denote their appointment. “For a few days, there was chaos. Now, we give token numbers at the entrance of the office itself,” Satav said.
At Kirkatwadi, which is also to be merged in PMC limits, the gram panchayat has created a database of applicants. They are tracking people accordingly.
Deputy sarpanch of Kirkatwadi Narendra Hagawane said, “We had received many applications for the registrations. After the decision of the merger, we held a meeting of the office-bearers and we created a database. Instead of these applicants coming to the office, our officials are contacting them and giving them the appointments. They are told about the documents required on phone so that the individual does not need to come in for inquiry.”
At some gram panchayats, the rush is minimal. However, they have vowed to maintain social distancing. An official from the Mahalunge office said, “We already have many registrations in place. However, considering the pandemic, we have decided to restrict the number of applications to be processed in a day. Apart from that, some officials have been asked to work even on holidays to avoid rush during the working days.”
