VIJAYAWADA: A day after the Andhra Pradesh High Court lifted the stay on entrusting Polavaram project works to a new agency, the Water Resources department has completed all the formalities to sign an agreement with Megha Engineering and Infrastructures Ltd (MEIL), which formally kick-started the works with ‘Bhoomi Pooja’ on Friday. Putting things on a fast track, the Water Resources officials said that the agency has begun dewatering of the work site, which has been flooded for the last couple of months.
The Water Resources department began the process of awarding the project work to MEIL on Thursday night, hours after the High Court issued its order, by getting the Letter of Acceptance (LoA) signed by the agency. “The agreement for entrusting irrigation works is ready and we expect to have it signed by Friday night. The APGENCO was also informed about it as there will be two separate agreements for irrigation works and 960 MW hydel power plant works,” an official explained.
Prior to the groundbreaking ceremony, Water Resources Minister P Anil Kumar said the High Court verdict was a vindication of the government’s stand and dismissed the aspersions cast by the Opposition leaders on Polavaram project as being politically motivated. “The project work will be completed on a war footing. We stood by our word and resumed Polavaram works on November 1. Unlike the previous government, we will take up civil work and Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement (LARR) work simultaneously to complete the project at the earliest,” he said, in a press meet at YSRC office in Tadepalli. The State government was able to save over `830 crore by going for reverse tendering for Polavaram project, he added.
According to a statement from MEIL, it is in the process of mobilising all the resources to complete the project within the time frame of two years. Since both judicial and administrative hurdles were cleared, the agency plans to continue regular work from Saturday by dewatering the inundated areas. It has already begun the survey and mobilisation of resources, and plans to launch works of both main reservoir and the hydel power plant simultaneously.
The Water Resources official said that it would take about a week for the works to gain momentum. “We expected about 50,000 - 60,000 cusecs of floodwater, but there was 2.17 lakh cusecs. The flood is expected to recede soon and it will take about a week for the works at the spillway to get an impetus,” the official observed.
On Friday, MEIL DGM Satish performed the groundbreaking ceremony at block 18 of the spillway. It maybe recalled that the government had cancelled the contract awarded to Navayuga Engineering Company Ltd (NECL) and went for reverse tendering. MEIL came forward to take up the project works at 12.6 per cent less than the price quoted by Navayuga.