Cash crunch halts Krishna Valley projects

Nagpur, Dec 12: Slowly but surely the prevailing resource crunch is casting its web over important State projects. Now, the entire work on...

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Nagpur, Dec 12: Slowly but surely the prevailing resource crunch is casting its web over important State projects. Now, the entire work on the Rs 11,000 crore irrigation projects being executed by the Krishna Valley Development Corporation (KVDC) in the Pune-Satara belt has come to a grinding halt owing to paucity of funds.

The KVDC headed by Irrigation Minister Ajit Pawar has issued an official circular to all heads of departments as well as Chief Engineers that owing to the resource crunch, no new work orders be issued until further instructions. Significantly, the corporation has failed to release the outstanding arrears of Rs 350 to the contractors.

“We have ordered stoppage of work, since we don’t have funds. The government does not have sufficient funds is a public knowledge now. The circular has been issued to avoid expenditure on works which need not be taken up immediately,” KVDC vice-chairman and Minister of State for Irrigation Ajit Ghorpade said.

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Ghorpade said the corporation was not keen to invest huge funds in such schemes which can be taken up at a later stage, the priority will be to finish the urgent works.

At a juncture when the Congress-led Democratic Front Government has refused to bail out the corporation, it is now completely dependent on the Rs 300 crore bonds, which were issued on December 1 and another Rs 400 crore, which will be released soon.

This is the second time after the inception of the KVDC, that major works have come to a grinding halt owing to paucity of funds. When Manohar Joshi was at the helm of affairs during the Sena-BJP rule, leading contractors had staged a massive dharna in the KVDC office at Pune, when the corporation failed to release their arrears of Rs 1,500 crore.

A senior official said, since the formation of autonomous irrigation corporations for Western Maharashtra, Marathwada, North Maharashtra and Vidarbha, it was their responsibility to mobilise resources. “The Congress-led DF Government is not in a position to release even meagre funds for the ongoing projects. We have already imposed a cut of 15 per cent on the budgetary outlay and another five per cent on non-planned expenditure. Under such circumstances, it will not be possible to release any funds for the KVDC,” a senior official said.