Team Herald
Panjim: The Capital City is one of the 100 smart cities across the country under the Government of India scheme. But the ongoing work at Ribandar has been causing a lot of hardship to the local residents as well as for vehicular traffic.
Panjim is almost in the digging mode with every road being dug in order to complete the work.
As per the display board, the work was actually to be completed on January 9, 2020 but the work completion failed. The area has not been restored to its original position. On noticing the same, the smart city officials tore off the sticker and some boards were even found painted while the date display were torn.
When this matter was brought to the notice of the smart city officials, they immediately swung into action and cleared the date and were informed that the contractor has been given extension until October 9, 2020.
However, the ongoing work of the Imagine Smart City Mission is seen going at the slower pace. The underground cabling work in Panjim city, which is Imagine Smart City Mission has missed the deadline which ended on January 9, 2020. At present under the smart city mission the Panjim city is undergoing underground cabling for the 11 KV cabling and the 90 per cent work has been completed.
Sources informed that the work could not be completed on time due to monsoon and permission from PWD, CCP and District Collector. However, the due date to the contractor has been extended till October 9, 2020 wherein all the underground works are expected to be completed.
So far Rs 40 crore has been spent for the underground digging, cabling and to install CSS (compact sub stations).
Sources also informed that due to congestion and haphazard parking the digging work is hindered and could not be done during the day and hence all digging works are done during the night manually by the labourers.
Another reason for the delay is due to various other pipelines which are already underground and utmost care has been taken not to damage the present pipelines.
The officials also informed that there have been intense support and cooperation from the Panjim MLA Babush Monserrate to complete the works but CCP is kept in dark and is not known about the development. But recently a joint inspection between CCP and the smart city officials was held for the development of the smart city mission.
When questioned about the maintenance, sources informed that on the day of the execution of the work, the company will provide five years maintenance to the underground cabling for the smart city project.
