Ranchi: The state urban development department will be setting up a Jharkhand Urban Planning and Management Institute (JUPMI) for capacity building of officials and elected representatives in various municipal bodies of the state.

Department secretary, Arun Kumar Singh said, "The proposal for JUPMI has been prepared and will soon be sent to the cabinet for approval."

The plan is to develop JUPMI as a capacity building centre for all the employees, both regular and contractual, under all the 41 urban local bodies of the state and also elected representatives like ward councillors, deputy mayor and mayor.

A senior official of the department said on terms of anonymity said, "The training to employees and elected representatives is still given by the department but we are unable to do it in an organized way, at a particular place. Once the centre is started, we will be able to train everybody from the senior officials to the junior-most staff linked to various programmes and schemes of the department under one roof."

The employees will be trained on all the components of 74th amendment of the Indian Constitution which talks about empowering urban local bodies.

This apart, the plans are also to rope in local youth and train them about the various schemes of the government like Swachh Bharat Mission and others.