Rajahmundry: Work on the prestigious multi-purpose Polavaram irrigation project is ‘technically’ stalled as the Centre has not issued an order which will keep the ‘stop work’ order issued by the Ministry of Environment and Forests in abeyance for one more year. The existing order ends on July 2. Various components of the project are proceeding at a brisk pace at Polavaram and in other parts of the two Godavari districts.
The state government claims that nearly 56 per cent of the work is over as on July 2. But work may be halted for a brief period until the Centre issues an order to keep the ‘stop work order’ in abeyance for one more year beginning from July 3, so that the project authorities can go ahead with the execution of the project.
The MoEF issued a ‘stop work order’ following complaints lodged by the Odisha and Chhattisgarh governments, alleging that the mandatory public hearings had not been held in their project affected areas.
Such hearings are compulsory to get environmental clearance for such a project. But to get around this hurdle, the Centre every year issues an order to keep the stop work order in abeyance and thus allow the work to continue. Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu has written letters to the Union government requesting it to permanently lift the ‘stop work order’ so that the state government does not have to approach the Centre every year with a request to keep the order in abeyance and work on the project can proceed at a faster pace to meet the end-2019 scheduled date of completion.
As long as the relationship between the AP government led by the TD and the BJP-led NDA at the Centre was cordial, such an arrangement worked well. But with the strained relations between the state government and the Centre, it has to be seen how the Centre responds to the AP government’s request to keep the order in abeyance once again. Chief engineer of the Polavaram project V. Sridhar said, “We are waiting eagerly for communication from the Centre on keeping the stop work order in abeyance. Meanwhile, we are taking up preparatory and other supporting work on the Polavaram project.”
