A human development report to assess the status of the existing social infrastructure and the socio-economic status of the residents in the Tiruchi Corporation limits would soon be prepared by faculty members and research scholars of the Department of Economics of Annamalai University.
The project, funded by the Directorate of Municipal Administration, would be completed in six months. The department has been asked to prepare a similar report for the Tirunelveli Corporation.
The report would assess various aspects of human development covering factors such as personal income including employment, livelihood poverty, slums and the quality of life in the city, the educational status of the city residents including enrolment and literacy levels; the health status including morbidity, mortality rates, water supply and sanitation, and other physical infrastructure such as environment, e-governance and funds flow.
According to L. Malathi, Head, Department of Economics, Annamalai University, and principal coordinator, and T.R.Jeyaraaj, coordinator, the main focus of the project would be to identify the status of physical and social infrastructure; assess the pattern and delivery of urban infrastructural services in the city; identify the problems in delivery of the services; assess the contribution of the services for human development and suggest a regulatory framework and corrective measures for regional imbalances.
The first consultative meeting between the project team, the corporation officials, representatives of voluntary organisations and other stakeholders was held in the city on Thursday.
Inaugurating the session, T.Soundiah, Collector, said the study would factor in various social, economic and health aspects. The report would help in better planning and achieving the socio-economic development goals of the government.
Mrs. Malathi said apart from collating data available with the corporation, research scholars would interview a cross section of people in each of the 60 wards in the city for a realistic assessment. The status of general administration, education, health, town planning and engineering, environment, social welfare and funds flow would be the broad areas that would be taken into account in the preparation of the report.
D.Namachivayam, faculty, Annamalai University, and one of the team members, said the report would help assess the quality of life. The varsity's Economics Department faculty members, Manonmani, Hariharan and Nagaraj, and about 10 research scholars would be involved in the preparation of the report.
Corporation Commissioner T.T.Balsamy and Deputy Mayor M. Anbazhagan spoke.
