VISAKHAPATNAM: Even though Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu is straining his every sinew to make the impossible happen - commissioning of Polavaram before the elections arrive in 2019 or even earlier - the project has not yet gained as much momentum as he expects.
The sea has become very choppy and Naidu is using the last ounces of his resourcefulness in navigating through the troubled waters.
It is a race against deadline.
He knows very well that the Polavaram is a test to his administrative skills. If he makes it happen, it would stand as sentinel to the popular belief that there is no one who can beat Naidu in getting things done.
They have already seen him how he had built an IT superstructure in Hyderabad which made even country’s IT capital Bangalore sit up and take notice.
In fact it is widely believed that the people had given a massive mandate to him keeping trust in his ability to rebuild the State since it stood divided into two sibling States as they went to the polls in 2014, dashing all hopes of YSR Congress chief YS Jagan Mohan Reddy who was eager to become the chief minister of the truncated State.
After Naidu took over as the Chief Minister in 2014, he has taken up Polavaram as a challenge. Ever since, he has been pursuing the project doggedly even though in the beginning the Centre remained a little unhelpful in releasing funds.
Now the response is much better, probably because he, as it wanted him to, compromised on special category status for the State.
In fact, after Krishna Pushkarams last year, he began paying a lot of attention on Polavaram. He has been reviewing the progress of the project on a weekly basis. Probably no Chief Minister in the past had paid so much attention on any project since he knows it would be a ‘vote cow’ for him in the next elections.
The State government expects the Centre to approve its revised 2013-14 estimates for the project which may be anywhere between `35,000 crore and `40,000 crore. So far a total sum of `13,000 crore has been spent on the project. As many as 111 excavators and 522 vehicles are working at the project site non-stop.
Naidu estimates that if the work gets stalled at the project site, it would mean a loss of about `21 crore per day. The total project cost has shot up from `16,010 crore in 2010-11 estimates because land for land and compensation has to be calculated separately under the Land Acquisition Act, 2013.
If this is one aspect, Naidu has to contend with the neighbours and the apex court. In the past, the Supreme Court admitted a petition which contended that the Polavaram Project Authority under the Union Water Resources Ministry had violated several Acts, including ST and Forest Dwellers Act, 2006, Forest Conservation Act, 1980, Environment Protection Act, 1986 and Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, 2013.
Recently, a PIL filed in the Supreme Court by an organisation Rela expressed apprehension that four lakh people in three States and 8,000 acres of forest land and 500 acres of wildlife sanctuary would go under Polavaram. As eight cases dealing with Polavaram project are pending in the apex court for years, it is giving the State government enough cover to go ahead with the project.
In the beginning of this month, at the meeting of the standing committee of the Inter-State Council held at Delhi, Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik raised concerns over the inter-State project and said that the Centre had given a go-by to the principles of fair-play by declaring unilaterally Polavaram as a national project. He wanted the Centre to annul the national project status bestowed on Polavaram.
The Centre has in fact washed its hands off as far as the inter-State disputes are concerned. Union Water Resources Minister Uma Bharti had gone on record in the past that it was up to AP and Odisha how they settle the issue and that the Centre can do nothing about it.
Polavaram surely is a test for Naidu’s ability in making things happen. “Come what may, I will make Polavaram ready by 2019,” he said very recently, while admitting that there were several imponderable in the way.
“There are several forces which are trying to impede the progress to suit their nefarious political interests. Some have gone to courts. But I will make Polavaram happen,” Naidu said.