A corporation council will pass a resolution on Friday giving a private
contractor, who was to complete storm water drains leading into the
Buckingham Canal by December 2012, time till June 30. The civic body
says it has informed the committee at the Centre, under whose Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission the project was taken up, that it could not stick to the original deadline as

The resolution will blame the delay on the 2011 local body elections and monsoon.

The project to construct 844km of storm water drains was taken up at an
estimated 814 crore in January 2009. But, the actual work began in
September 2009 due to a delay in procuring a government order and in
getting contractors. The deadline for most areas was December 2012. It
was April 2013 for the rest. With reports suggesting that barely 60% of
the work is complete, many are sceptical about the corporation being
able to meet the new deadline. “It took them two years and three months
to complete this much, I don’t expect them to complete it in another
four months,” said an Adyar resident.

The other project, to set
up compact, colorful public toilets on city roads, may remain on paper
for a while. Corporation officials say the only bidder for one of the
tenders is not likely to qualify and a re-tender could be floated. This
was already the second time the tender to set up colored polycarbonate
toilets was floated.

The civic body floated tenders for 2,000
pre-fabricated toilets, made of polycarbonate or polyethylene sheets, in
December in three packages – two for 500 toilets each in North and
South Chennai and the third for 1,000 toilets in Central Chennai. Only
the package for Central Chennai attracted a bidder. The tender invited
firms to build, operate and maintain the toilets for 20 years and earn
revenues from advertising.

The corporation first floated
tenders for 5,000 pre-fabricated toilets in August. and said companies
should build the toilets and maintain it for ten years, during which
they can earn their returns from advertising the outer space.

It did not receive a single bidder even by the end of September. The
corporation is hesitant to pump in its money and take up the projects
that don’t get contractors.

“If they don’t get bidders even
twice, they should take up the projects themselves,” said an advertising
professional, whose firm had backed out of the bus shelter bid last
year. Had things worked out, the toilets would have come up by
January-end. “If contractors had come forward in August, work orders
could have been issued in September. Setting up the toilets wouldn’t
have taken more than 3-4 months,” said a former corporation official.

Other major projects by the Chennai Corporation
that have been delayed are the mega city road project which was to be
completed by September 2012 and the 1,024 new bus shelters that are yet
to see the light of the day.