UGD work execution delayed.

One of the areas where the Coimbatore Corporation would have liked to rate itself higher in the self evaluation report to be submitted to the Central Government for Smart City project is project implementation.

It could not because the underground drainage work, approved of and sanctioned at least six years ago, is still under progress. The Corporation is still laying pipelines, is caught in a dispute with the National Highways over the aligning pipelines in Ondipudur and with the residents of gated communities on Nanjundapuram Road over the choice of the site for the construction of a sewage treatment plant.

The result of the delay and dispute is that the project cost has increased, at least by over Rs. 15 crore for the Nanjundapuram sewage treatment plant (package five). That the Corporation has not been able to resume construction is another story.

The Corporation began the Rs. 400-crore project with funds from the Central Government under the Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission scheme. It was to complete the six phases of the project in the next three to four years. But it has not been able to.

The current status is that only 78 per cent of the third package, which includes work to lay 297 km pipeline, is complete. One of the reasons for the delay is that the Corporation and the National Highways have not reached an agreement on aligning pipelines on Trichy Road.

The second reason is the dispute with the residents, which is now before courts. And, the third is that the Corporation has not yet obtained the Southern Railway’s permission for taking the underground drainage pipeline across the railway line in Ondipudur.

Sources familiar with the execution of the project say that the delay betrays poor planning and absence of project implementation skills. The alignment of pipelines and permission for laying pipelines across the railway track are something that the civic body should have thought of much earlier; not towards the end of the project.

Even if the problems are resolved, there remains the issue of giving house service connections – there are over 20,000 connections to be given and that again involves digging roads. And, then, collecting user charges.


THE HINDU