PANJIM: The Corporation of the City of Panaji (CCP) has once again written to the Goa Engineering College (GEC), Farmagudi, Ponda, to carry out inspection and structural stability audit of the corroded foot over bridge (FOB) opposite Sharda Mandir School on Jack Sequeira Road at Miramar which has become a white elephant.
In a reminder letter written to GEC Principal, CCP Commissioner Clen Madeira has said, “You are once again requested to conduct the site inspection of foot overbridge near Miramar junction and carry out the structural stability audit of the bridge and submit a report to this office within seven days from the date of the receipt of the letter.”
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The reminder has been sent as there is no response from the Goa Engineering College to the letter written to it by the CCP in August last year requesting it to carry out the inspection and structural stability audit of the foot overbridge.
A senior CCP official said that as there is no response from the GEC to the letter till date, the Corporation may send an official to meet the Principal of the College to personally request him to depute a team to carry out the inspection and the audit.
The footbridge was constructed at a cost of Rs 1.25 crore by a Hyderabad-based private contractor on public private partnership (PPP) model in 2012. The private contractor entered into an agreement with the CCP and the foot overridge was thrown open to the public on July 16, 2012. However, it turned into a white elephant as it was rarely used by the students of the Sharda Mandir or other people.
Now, the CCP is finding itself in the helpless situation as the private contractor has approached the court contending that it has not been able to recover the amount it invested in the project.
According to the CCP official, inspection of the bridge is required to be done to declare it unsafe.
The authority to declare the foot overbridge is with the Government Polytechnic, Panjim, or Goa Engineering College (GEC), Farmagudi, Ponda.
The Goa government had signed an agreement with the private contractor in 2011 for 15 years. The agreement was on the basis of build-operate and transfer. Traffic Police have already declared that the structure is weak.
However, speaking to
O Heraldo, CCP Mayor Rohit Monserrate expressed his inability to take any immediate action since the matter is in Court.
Any decision has not been taken with regards to the foot overbridge as the matter is subjudice, he said.
In a meeting held in October in 2022, the CCP had decided to conduct structural assessment of the overbridge as it was rusted and there were reports of its parts falling down on the road thus endangering the life of public and vehicular traffic.
The matter was discussed during the CCP ordinary meeting held last week. It was decided to request either the Goa Engineering College (GEC), Farmagudi or the Government Polytechnic, Panjim to carry out a structural audit of the overbridge so as to check its overall health or strength of the structure and to give recommendations.
It was decided that based on the technical report, the Corporation will take further action for dismantling the corodded overbridge by following all the necessary formalities and also after clarifying from the CCP legal cell that there is no litigation pending before any court of law.
