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| I&FC wastes Rs 3.67 crore from public purse on redundant storage units | | Deptt executes work without acquiring clearance from forest, defence authorities, expenditure wasted with impunity | | Early Times Report
jammu, Mar 31: The mismanagement in the construction of water storage tanks in various areas of Jammu and Kashmir by the Irrigation and Flood Control department has led to the loss of whooping Rs 3.67 crores with the department taking up the execution of work without acquiring the private land and seeking prior clearance from Forest Department and Defence Authority.
Official documents in possession of the Early Times newspaper reveal that in order to provide irrigational facilities to farmers for agricultural activities in Tehsil Handwara and Kupwara, the Irrigation and Flood Control (I&FC) Division, Handwara, proposed three projects involving construction of 27 storage tanks in Brinyal Rajwad, Natnussa Kandi and Rajwad at an estimated cost Rs 26.42 crore (13 tanks in Natnussa Kandi at an estimated cost of Rs 11.08 crore; 13 Tanks in Rajwad at an estimated cost of Rs 10.80 crore and one Brinyal tank at Rajwad at an estimated cost of Rs 4.54 crore), under Border Area Development Programme (BADP) in the year 2013. The stipulated period for completion of works was two years from the date of sanction of the project.
Documents reveal that 11 out of a total of 27 storage tanks, had no requirement for acquisition of private/ Forest land and only one out of 27 storage tanks to be constructed was fully functional.
An amount of Rs 9.90 crore was released during the period from 2013 to 2019 and the Division had incurred an expenditure of Rs 6.43 crore as of March 2019. Scrutiny of records revealed that despite the availability of Rs 9.90 crore, an amount of Rs 3.47 crore (35 per cent of the total allotment) could not be utilised. Further, out of the 27 storage tanks, only one storage tank was completed.
Furthermore, out of 16 storage tanks that were proposed to be constructed requiring a total of 41.05 hectare of private/ forest land, nine storage tanks, were taken up for construction without clearance being obtained from the Forest Department or private land being acquired for executing these works. An expenditure of Rs 3.37 crore was incurred during the period 2013 to 2019 on these nine storage tanks. As regards the nine storage tanks (estimated cost: Rs 11.49 crore) involving use of 35.15 hectare of private/ forest land an expenditure of Rs 3.37 crores was incurred on storage tanks which were not complete and only two storage tanks were semi-functional. Therefore, the expenditure of Rs 3.04 crore incurred on seven incomplete and nonfunctional storage tanks was wasted. Similarly, in case of the 11 storage tanks (estimated cost: Rs 7.80 crore50) which did not require any private/ forest land, an expenditure of Rs 3.06 crore was incurred (2013 to 2019) on execution of work of ten storage tanks (one storage tank was not taken up for construction due to land dispute). Further, only one storage tank out of these ten storage tanks was fully functional and six were semi-functional. Besides, the three remaining storage tanks were not even partially functional despite expenditure of Rs 63.19 lakh being incurred on these tanks. Out of these three storage tanks, two were abandoned after incurring an expenditure of Rs 43.59 lakh. As the land identified for the Gunsnar storage tank was close to an army ammunition depot for which clearance from Army was not granted (July 2020) and the alternate site selected for this storage tank Kinjaldoori Nichama failed in soil testing, rendering an expenditure of Rs 43.59 lakh wasted. |
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