"Road stretch on
which the drainage work was undertaken
in a haste may be
widened in coming days and the effort and the money which has been put in would go down the drain."
Avinash Azad
Early Times Report
Jammu, Feb 27: The Road and Buildings Department has ostensibly executed 22 kilometre drainage project between Siot to Kalakote without inviting tenders and had allegedly allotted the work to blue eyed contractors through the backdoor, sources told Early Times on Friday.
They said the road stretch on which the drainage work was undertaken in a haste may be widened in coming days and the effort and the money which has been put in would go down the drain.
"Under rules, there may be a provision to carry out some works departmentally in case of emergency situations like floods, heavy snowfall or any other natural disasters. But if you go through the executed works, you will find that most of them didn't deserve to be carried out on emergency basis when compared with other unexecuted works," sources said.
Officials believe that executing works without tendering process has become a norm in the R&B Department for varied reasons.
They said, " Soon after the new government would be formed in JK the road where the new drain has been constructed is all set to be widened as the previous regime had directed concerned department to finalize the project", sources informed.
"This has raised a question mark on the financial dealings of the Department as the works executed in violation of codal formalities amount to crores of rupees. In most cases, the rates for these works have either been fixed by Heads of the Departments or by Superintending or Executive Engineers. While officials cite "exigency" for carrying out works departmentally," sources said. "The works were allotted arbitrarily to blue-eyed persons under the garb of exigency."
"It is all politics," said an R&B official, wishing anonymity. "The works are either allotted to the workers of political parties or the contractors who happen to be close to MLAs in different localities. If you go and analyze the works undertaken, you will find gross violation of construction norms and use of substandard material. But there is nobody in the department to investigate and see whether the works undertaken were allotted and executed as per the norms."
However, the Executive Engineer, PWD, R&B, Division Nowshera, Parvez Ahmed refuted the allegations saying, "No such work was executed without tenders." |
