Post News Network
Bhubaneswar, Oct 4: The state government has decided to conduct Third Party Quality Monitoring (TPQM) of projects such as Mukhya Mantri Sadak Yojana (MMSY) and Biju Setu Yojana (BSY) to ensure proper quality in these projects.
For the 1638.31 km road work the state government is set to take up in all districts of the state in 2015-16 under Mukhya Mantri Sadak Yojana (MMSY), many tenders have been reportedly received at substantially low rates, even to the extent of nearly 15 per cent less than normal rates. “This has necessitated an independent quality monitoring mechanism for the projects, which is why such projects would be put under a TPQM consultancy,” said a senior official of the rural works division.
Sources said as many as 417 different road projects will be taken up under MMSY, an ambitious scheme of the Naveen Patnaik-led government that envisages construction of roads in 6,155 villages with a population of more than 100, which makes for a total of 20,000 km roads in the state.
Similarly, the need for a third-party quality check was felt for a large number of bridges being constructed under BSY with values less than Rs 3 crore, said sources. This assumes significance as the CAG, in its report for the year ending March 2014, had pulled up the state government for violation of the scheme’s guidelines in the selection of sites for construction of bridges and not meeting deadlines.
Officials said that all road projects, irrespective of their values under MMSY, will undergo TPQM, while TPQM will be undertaken for bridge projects under BSY worth Rs 2 crore and above.
“There was deviation from the guidelines in selection of sites for construction of 13 bridges with estimated cost of Rs 20.62 crore, of which Rs 10.58 crore were expended as of January 2015,” the CAG report had said.
The audit had further noticed that construction of 12 bridges, which were earlier proposed under other plan schemes including three under PMGSY and not taken up for execution, were included without examining their eligibility under BSY guidelines.
The state government launched BSY in October 2011 to bridge the missing links on roads of Rural Development (RD) department and strategically important Panchayat Samiti roads belonging to Panchayati Raj (PR) department.
