MARADU: It seems that the Public Works Department (PWD) will not be able to meet the October 2015 deadline for the Kundanoor-Nettoor parallel bridge. According to sources, the authorities have been taking frequent breaks owing to various reasons since the work began last October.
In the list of regular disruptions, the recent and the longest one was a month ago and the work is yet to resume.
PWD executive engineer Kamalam told ‘City Express’ that they had to halt the work as the private contractor, who was entrusted with the work, took up another work at Kottayam.
“Though the company assured us that they will resume the work within two weeks, they are yet to do so,” she said. She added that they had issued a notice to the contractor directing him to resume the work immediately.
“We have been informed by the contractor that they will resume the work of the bridge only after completing the work at Kottayam. If they failed to resume the work immediately, we will take legal actions against them,” she said.
In the beginning of the project, the construction of the bridge was temporarily stalled for three weeks as the piling work damaged the pipeline of the Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission (JNNURM) Drinking Water Project that pass through the area for supplying water to West Kochi. Also, the Vigilance probe into the corruption charges against the funds allotted for the project had disrupted the work for a week.
The bridge is the hope of residents at Nettoor as it will ease the traffic congestion in the area. The project had got government sanction over 21 years ago and the agitations had been going on for the past 26 years. ENS