Now GPS to check rising fuel bills of JMC vehicles

Tahir Mushtaq

JAMMU, Mar 03: With fuel bills showing rapid increase and becoming a burden on the scarce resources of the Jammu Municipal Corporation (JMC), it is planning to track its vehicles by using Global Positioning System (GPS).

Officials said that these Vehicle Tracking Management System (VTMS) will be installed on more than 170 vehicles at the disposal of the corporation for lifting nearly 300 tonnes of garbage daily and other uses.

Officials said that they have fitted some of the vehicles with these VTMS and if their performance is good, entire fleet will be fitted with these instruments.

The installation of the system has become imperative as with the rise in the number of vehicles involved in keeping the city clean, there have been continuous complaints that drivers are submitting erroneous bills. The project will cost about Rs 12 lakh and is being implemented in phased manner.

 “It will improve the functioning of the field staff and deter people from misusing the vehicles and theft of fuel. It is an innovative step to monitor and manage the municipal solid waste utility vehicles by keeping a track of their routes”, he said.  There have been complaints that garbage dumps were not being lifted in time and they were at times submitting excess of bills on fuel use.

Jammu generates nearly 300 tonnes of garbage daily and it is expected that the there will be tremendous increase in the solid waste generation in next decade.

“To tide away the shortage of manpower, we will have to depend on the new technology to keep pace with the expanding city. In next few years, Jammu may surpass major metropolitan city in generation of garbage”, said a municipal official.

Most of the vehicles have been specially allotted to the areas particularly the outskirts of the city, where new colonies have sprang up in past two decades.

“Jammu is expanding at very fast pace and we also have to equip corporation with new technology to deal with the new challenges”, said a official.

When the corporation was formed in 2005, the emphasis was laid on modernization of equipment to make it a modern organisation to deal with the rapidly increasing  population in the city, but the funds crunch had marred the plans of the corporation.