The Hindu : Tenders open for road works

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Thursday, Nov 21, 2002

Southern States

Southern States - Tamil Nadu-Chennai

Tenders open for road works

By Karthik Subramanian

CHENNAI NOV. 20 . Several tenders for road works were opened at the Chennai Corporation headquarters, Ripon Buildings, today for the first time after the Government asked the agency to postpone the process in the first week of September.

The tender processing, particularly for road works, was halted over the last couple of months in a bid to work out a more `transparent' system. The centralised system was arrived at after the Corporation was rocked by allegations of favouritism in the award of tenders for road works to the tune of Rs. 39 crores in July and August.

It was alleged that several contractors were denied tender schedules and work was awarded only to a `select' group. An enquiry was ordered into the allegations and another committee comprising civic officials worked out the modalities for the new `transparent' system.

Earlier, the tender openings were happening at the zonal offices. During such instances, it was common to witness `open bidding' by a group of contractors to settle the contracts among themselves after paying off a percentage to those who gave up the works. This way, a certain percentage of contract amount in each package was lost and eventually had a bearing on the quality of roads.

Under the new system, the tenders for zone I and some other bus route roads were opened at the Golden Jubilee hall of the civic agency in the presence of senior engineers.

The sale of tenders has also been extended to all the zones in addition to Ripon Buildings to ensure fair processing, said a senior official.

Uneven surface

Meanwhile, some of the roads taken up for relaying in zone VIII showed that not enough basic work was being taken up before paving the surface. This was visible on Ashok Nagar Fourth Main Road, and the newly-repaired road has uneven surfaces and no shoulder.

The Chennai Corporation has been awarding contracts for road laying, without insisting on shoulders for the carriageway, rendering most city roads useless for about two to four feet on either side.

The State Highways has also launched repairs to some roads like the Inner Ring Road now catering to heavy bus traffic, with similar poor attention to technical detail.

Also, some areas, such as Arya Gowda Road and West Mambalam, are going without bus service, because the Corporation has not repaired roads for months.

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