Date:21/09/2008 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2008/09/21/stories/2008092152710300.htm

Andhra Pradesh

Water issue dominates meet

Staff Reporter

Kakinada: The inability of the Rural Water Supply Department in taking timely action to solve problems in drinking water supply and delays in construction of houses under the Indiramma scheme were the highlights of the District Vigilance and Monitoring Committee meeting held here on Saturday. MLAs told the committee that repeated pleas for remedial action failed to yield the desired result, due to which they were incurring the wrath of people.

Defunct bore-wells

Water supply pipelines were leaking at several places in the district and many bore-wells became defunct due to lack of maintenance. But, officials were apparently taking ad-hoc measures, they said.

Whether the officials were passing the buck on other departments on administrative grounds or there were genuine limitations, people should not suffer, MLAs Chinnam Babu Ramesh (Yellavaram) and Dommeti Venkateswarulu (Tallarevu) observed.

They also complained that there was no proper monitoring of the drinking water supply through tankers, some of which were coming to the habitations half-empty but the bills were cleared promptly. There were a good number of schools which don’t have drinking water facility despite the priority attached to the provision of basic infrastructure in government schools, which were functioning against all odds. The fact that bankers were not coming forward to extend bridge loans for construction of Indiramma houses unless a sort of counter-guarantee was given to them was another important item brought to the committee’s notice.

MLA Thota Gopalakrishna (Peddapuram) suggested that the Collector should have funds at his disposal to part-finance the construction of houses allotted to SC, STs. Collector Gopalakrishna Dwivedi said he would examine the factors causing delay in implementation of Indiramma housing scheme.

Union Minister of State for Defence and Kakinada MP M.M. Pallam Raju sought priority for improving road connectivity in the Agency areas.

Bhadrachalam MP M. Babu Rao, who chaired the meeting, said some officials were giving routine answers.