The Times of India            15.02.2014

Civic body to seek Rs 92cr loan from Hudco

KOLHAPUR: The Kolhapur Municipal Corporation is planning to procure loan of Rs 91.44 crore from the Housing and Urban Development Corporation (Hudco) for the developmental projects under the Nagarotthan Abhiyan sponsored by the state government. The standing committee of the KMC gave approval to the proposal on Friday.

In 2010, the state government had approved a road construction project worth Rs 108.11 crore and a storm water drainage project amounting to Rs 75.58 crore under the Nagarotthan Abhiyan. Accordingly, the KMC was given the task to complete the 49-km road construction work and construction of drains along 93.85 km roads, culverts at 41 places, retaining walls at the existing nullahs to prevent the flood water from entering the residential premises and nullah channelization (13.58 km).

Sachin Chavan, chairman of the standing committee, told TOI, "Owing to poor financial condition of the civic administration, it was not able to raise the share of funds required for the implementation of the project. Therefore, we approved a proposal seeking loan with an annual interest rate of 11.75%. Hudco has said that it will provide us the loan. The work will gather momentum as soon as the funds arrive."

The KMC was among five other urban local bodies which received funds under the Nagarotthan Abhiyan. The work which started in early 2011 has not been completed yet as the KMC was unable to raise funds.

"The deadline for road construction work and the storm water drainage project ended last year. The contractors were not unable to deliver properly and therefore, most of the work has been retendered. The earlier contractors were blacklisted," Chavan added.

Earlier, the civic administration had given the works to Shantinath Roadways, VUB engineering and Relcon infrastructure. The contractors found the work difficult due to reluctance of the civic administration to provide funds on time. Besides, there were delays in providing the designs of the storm water drains on part of the civic administration.

"The response to the retendered work is slow and the contractors are not willing to work within the stipulated amount. We have urged the local contractors to take part in the bidding process unlike last time when they were forbidden to fill the tender forms owing to low turnover," Chavan added.