Minister’s firm pulled up for slow work on Polavaram project

Hyderabad: The Centre is seriously dissatisfied with the slow progress of work on the Polavaram project. In a letter to the AP government, Polavaram chief executive officer Dinesh Kumar said: “There is no commitment on the agency’s part to execute the works. Action needs to be initiated against agencies where there is no progress or poor progress.”

The contract for the project was awarded to Transstroy, TD MP Rayapati Sambasiva Rao’s company.

Recently, the AP government’s roads and buildings department had sent a file to Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu, recommending terminating Transstroy’s contract for construction of a road from Kakinada to Rajahmundry due to slow progress.

Mr Dinesh Kumar in his letter, which is available with this newspaper, said: “It is worthwhile to mention that time and again the criticality of the works at the head works has been brought to the notice of all concerned and still there is no commitment on the part of the agency to execute the works.”

He said that pending the completion of the head works, completion of other works will not have the desired benefits contemplated under the project.

Mr Kumar added that issues such as finalisation of revised cost estimates, completion of designs, submission of details of assets and liabilities, finalisation of MoU between the Polavaram Project Authority and state government and issues related to contract management needed to be finalised as they have been pending for long.

He said questions had been raised in Parliament on issues such as reimbursement of funds to state government by PPA, land acquisition, rehabilitation and resettlement, and others. He said land, rehabilitation and resettlement issues, needed to be addressed on priority.

When contacted, Mr Sambasiva Rao said he was not aware of any such communication and added that his company’s CEO might know. He added that the CEO would be available only after two days.