AIADMK MLA's Pointed Out The Problem
AIADMK MLAs presenting a memorandum to Public Works Department officials in the city on Wednesday, alleging poor quality of canal maintenance works in the Parambikulam - Aliyar Project. A delegation of five Members of the Legislative Assembly (MLAs) of the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) presented a memorandum to the PWD authorities at Coimbatore alleging poor quality of canal maintenance works relating to the Parambikulam – Aliyar Project (PAP). The MLAs, Pollachi V. Jayaraman (Pollachi), S.M. Velusamy (Palladam), S.P. Velumani (Perur), C. Shanmugavelu (Udumalpet) and S. Damodaran (Kinathukkadavu), came to the Water Resource Organisation (WRO) of the Public Works Department (PWD) office at Coimbatore.In the absence of the Chief Engineer, the MLAs presented the memorandum to the Assistant Executive Engineer. The memorandum contended that maintenance works being undertaken at an outlay of Rs. 80 crore with World Bank funding was found to be of poor quality as alleged by the villagers.The MLAs said that the villagers found the quality of work being very poor and even the process of calling for tenders had been done in a manner in which the local people had been kept in the dark.
Considering the alleged poor quality of work done last year, the MLAs demanded that the entire work should be subjected to quality control and checks. The work quality should be examined and a detailed report should be submitted to the Government for initiating appropriate action. Considering the quality of the work, the MLAs said that the contractors should not be paid any advance and their bills should not be settled. Poor of quality of work in contour canal maintenance had resulted in wastage of water through seepage.
To ensure that the local population had adequate information and to generate awareness on the nature of work and the expected quality, details of the works being undertaken should be displayed in the form of a display or information board at the work site, they said. The MLAs sought the PWD authorities to provide them and the irrigation association office bearers with the details of the tender and contract awarded. They also demanded that the schedule, quantity of water being released for irrigation needs to be informed to the MLAs of the constituency.
