‘CM Palaniswami to launch Uratchikottai water project soon’
ERODE: Chief Minister Edappadi K Palaniswami would visit Erode and inaugurate the Rs 500-crore Uratchikottai Drinking Water Project by this month-end, said Erode MLAs KV Ramalingam (West) and KS Thennarasu (East). The MLAs garlanded the late chief minister MG Ramachandran’s statue to mark his 103rd birthday celebration at Erode PS Park on Friday.
“The project would be commissioned shortly. Ninety per cent of the project is completed. The trial run of pumping water in the main pipeline, spread over a stretch of 24 km from the Cauvery, near Varadapalayam in Bhavani, was successfully completed by TWAD Board recently. The water reached two major overhead tanks at Suriyampalayam and VOC Park and from where it would be distributed to 61 tanks and areas across the town,” they told TNIE.
The project was approved under the AMRUT Scheme by the NDA-I rule immediately after it came to power. “The project was pending for the past one decade. The then DMK rule did nothing to implement it. However, CM Jayalalithaa made efforts to get the sanction from the Centre. In fact, no municipal corporation has got this much fund for any project from the Centre and State,” they added. Highlighting the benefits of the scheme, they said that it would solve the drinking water problems faced by the Erode town for the next five decades.
Projects in the pipeline
The Chief Minister would also lay the foundation for a `300 crore flyover to be built from PWD guest house to Mel Thindal on Perundurai road during his visit to Erode. This flyover would reduce the growing traffic congestion on that main road leading to Coimbatore. The Chief Minister announced the scheme when he took part in the MGR centenary celebration in Erode on September 7, 2017, they added.