Hyderabad: The Telangana state government has ruled out giving any “mobilisation advance” to contractors for execution of irrigation projects.
The YSR government in united AP had adopted the policy of giving mobilisation advances, wherein contractors were given about 10 per cent of the project cost, of which 5 per cent was towards procuring men and material and the remaining 5 per cent for mobilising equipment.
However, inquiries by various government agencies later found that the amount was being misused and diverted for other purposes.
Speaking in the Assembly on Monday, irrigation minister T. Harish Rao said that the governments in undivided AP had given Rs 2,950 crore of public money to contractors as mobilisation advance, of which the TS government had so far recovered Rs 2,674 crore after contractors had failed to take up works.
Mr Rao said the TS government was in favour of allowing cost escalation of projects instead of cancelling old tenders and inviting new ones, since calling for new tenders at this stage would burden the government to the tune of Rs 15,000 crore, while cost escalation would result in an additional burden of only Rs 2,500 crore.
“Moreover, cancelling old tenders and calling new tenders at this stage may invite legal problems and delay the projects further. To overcome this, the government wants to approve cost escalation of projects as per existing rates,” he added.
Mr Rao informed the House that there were 27 pending projects in the state at present, which were in various stages of construction. The government needed to acquire 41,000 acres to complete all irrigation projects, he said.
