Why should infrastructure projects stop every time a government changes?
The Rs. 1,815 crore elevated expressway project from Chennai Port to Maduravoyal, started with much fanfare in September 2010, has been put on hold.
Hundreds of cement pillars standing alongside the meandering Cooum river have been silently awaiting a solution for the last seven months – yet another case of a delayed infrastructure project.
Who is to blame this time? Was it lack of proper planning? An unexpected hurdle?
This project had the support of both State and Central governments. The State agreed to contribute Rs. 470 crore in the form of land and relief and rehabilitation measures, the Central government, Rs. 500 crore and the Chennai Port, Rs. 235 crore. After an initial hurdle because of land acquisition, the project picked up pace and columns were built at various locations. In 2011 the government changed, and a year later, the project came to a grinding halt.
The reasons given were that the alignment was improper and pillars had encroached on the river bed obstructing the flow of water. What is strange is that it was the same set of officials of the Water Resources Department who cleared the project in the first place, who have now raised objections. How could a project that appeared all well and certified as acceptable by professionals a year ago, turn into something that is faulty?
Each passing day without any progress only increases the cost. The compensation to be paid by the National Highways Authority of India to the contractor under various heads rises. With 30 per cent of the project having been completed, and uncertainty still lingering, only public money seems to be wasted and the addition of infrastructure to the city is delayed.
This is not the only project the city is uncertain about. Chennai High Speed Circular Transportation Corridor that was to take off from Adyar and connect with Chennai Bypass has come to a complete halt. A detailed feasibility report was completed and a detailed project report was to have been prepared for the first phase.
Another proposal that has been grounded is the formation of bicycle tracks by the Chennai Corporation. The Corporation had been considering bicycle tracks in Adyar and Besant Nagar, areas that have a high density of schools and many students who get there by bicycle. Initially, an 8 km stretch of arterial roads in Anna Nagar, which serves 14 schools, was to be covered for a pilot project. Design proposals were prepared and even publicised. Now there is no news about the project.
The question is, why should critical infrastructure projects that are essential to the city stop every time a government changes? The departments and officials who administer the projects in one government completely change face and position when another takes over, and bring out convoluted reasons against implementing or completing them. It is the city and people who bear the brunt and suffer from these whimsical changes and decisions.
In neighbouring Andhra Pradesh and Kerala, despite changes in government, many projects continue. It appears public interest and careful use of common resource are a priority there. Will Chennai ever learn?
Keywords: Civic Sense column, Chennai Port expressway, Chennai infrastructure project, infrastructure development
Such a shame that the govts. dont read these articles and realize that they aren't working...
The learned public have voiced their legitimate opinions through these columns. Now, a mass movement is necessary to set right these things.
the funny thing is , if you ask anybody personally, he/she will express the unhappiness / unfaithfulness with the current political systems , but how come these politicians gets majority of votes and come in to power. It means , we don;t have any other choice except selecting them. This is really a problem. we need to think about it.
When people are aiming to be IAS / IPS / CEO / CTO /IIT'ans , why not people leader?
Dr. Jayalalitha and Dr. Karunanidhi whom ever it is , the state is
going to be like this . They think they are not answerable to people.
they know they are going to get votes ,when they give money or petty
things like stupid tvs, or say useless things . Have any of the
politicians who come to power have any idea about how people are
affected about their actions? All they care is how many C's depending
upon the post they are. I once learnt the rules and the criteria of
being a politicians ,well shamefully people in power do not even met
the needs. You work as a servant to these biggie's for six month or a
year and become a minister and Start earning money. if alone minister
and people of state have right to ask and stop voting for such useless
and self centred people. I wont them to feel they are not ruler ,they
are government employees like u and me and come and do they duty .
With voters changing govts.every 5 years,thiis farce continues. Imagine how much time the Perambur fly over took. Why cant they leasrn how thegolden qudrilateralscheme started by Sri Vajpayee's NDA govt.has beenn continued by Sri Manmohan singh's UPA and the benefits to the economy.Do the best that is your duty and if your voted out accept it with grace. People are not fools and they will draw the line--thus far and no further.
Hindu can open a special column enlisting the halted projects. Not only roadways, even some IT projects started in down south were halted by the new govt, for reasons nothing other than the reason being, it was started in previous govt.
my list of such projects,
1. TN secretriat complex,
2. Anna library,
3. Gangaikondan IT project, tirunelveli
4. Many power projects in mettur and north chennai
5.This articles maduravoyal elevated expressway
6. cooum cleaning project
hindu can periodically analyse and explain in detail
We as a common people need to think seriously about our nation. I feel that only in India , politicians are always focusing on their welfare. Nation's welfare is only a left out options for them.
No more faith with these politicians.They never help building India as a powerful nations in terms of prosperity and resource. Change should be as Paradigm shift. No more consideration and no more expectation from current politics. There is no point in blaming these guys. Those who are not fit. Simply move them out of the power.
That way only politicians can make money by passing new tenders.
This topic on stopping of the big ticket projects/works on change of Government should be an eye opener. What the local MLAs and Councillors are doing? Is it not their responsibility to push for the progress? Even widening of the Ayanavaram Road connecting Kilpauk and Annanagar is suspended. The half finished road is used for all sorts of sundry works by the locals. There should be a constitutional/legal requirement for continuation of such type of work.
Hello Guys, Do you think posting your concerns for the welfare of the
state will ever change.. no ways. Fast Money, Fast Life, Fast
Corruption. All politicians and the supporters all behind Money.
Nothing is proved in the public any projects which happens in the
state, the cost and the quality. All public concerned about the
independent life. Tax payers they can only mourn about the tax cutting
and they found out the other way how to cut the tax down by bank loan.
But honestly they are penny wise pound foolish. Banks take their
advantage simple as that. We have ministers, president and prime
minister who could not able to walk or to speak. One way other scared
off political parties or religions or communities. Younger generation
needs western life and becoming more worst than western culture.If
China could conduct the Olympics successfully why not we? please think
about whats the possible cause?
The problem lies with politicians eyeing for capturing governments, be
it State or Central. If the party at the State is on the other side of coalition, the Central Government turns a blind eye on the State
Government's initiatives on new Projects. The same goes to State
Government too. Now that the Parliament elections are on the cards, it
is all the more evident. The officials also change hats according to
the parties that comes to power; very visible is the "ONE-WAY
TRAFFIC"; everything changed once the government changes. We don't
have to follow or take lessons from Western Countries, but simply
follow our conscience and work truthfully to the welfare of the
current and future generation.
This is a classic case of the Bribe given to the party in previous government is not motivating the party in the incumbent govt. unless it is of the same party
The enormous hatred between the two Dravidian leaders is holding the Tamilian and
the State to ransom. This is across all spheres from Sri Lankan Tamil cause to
infrastructure projects in Tamil Nadu. These leaders should be ashamed of
themselves for letting the very people who brought them glory badly down.
Probably another PIL in court will only help stop such delay in infrastructure projects.
The common man always suffers. Government not bothered. We need
visionary government. Tax payers money are wasted. Am frequent visitor
to Japan and have seen how the projects are being completed on time. I
don't know whether the government will listen to this take action. First
of all the officers should work in honest and not listen to the
government. You can add Porur junction bridge. How CMDA can approve huge
residential buildings and malls with out proper bridge at Porur.
lets pray god to give good thinking to the government.
Hi,
Hyderabad MMTS Phase I modernization and Phase II implementation are also good examples.
Well said.Officials dance to the tune of politicians to keep themselves in their good books.Tamilnadu officials are divided between the two DOCTORS for more than two decades.
The correspondents vainly believe that we can learn lessons from
matured democracies like US and others in the west. Our politicians as
well as voters lack not only magnanimity and maturity but also
sufficient education to boot out those corrupt elements. As one
correspondents has remarked, if we have to live with these immature
and highly corrupt politicians (both Jayalaitha and Karunanidhi
included)let us at least give them some consecutive terms so that they
can fill up their coffers and also finish some of the long gestation
projects. Dictatorial democracy? Again, you need a benevolent dictator
as Cho used to advocate some decades ago;
It is too much to expect tolerance and decency from our politicians. Recently a party functionary who was a prominent doctor was sacked from the party just because he had arranged a marriage alliance for his daughter with the son of the opposition party. When will our leaders grow, mature and think public is more important than their personal agenda?
I'm not great at politics and am not sure how does government propose new plans/projects, be it infrastructure or anything else. However, I believe they would have to come up with a budget and ofcourse a time frame before starting any project. And before doing that, depending upon the size and cost of the project, there should be some sort of agreement between the ruling party and the opposition during assembly meetings. I think there are no ideologies for the political parties in India to stick to and speak for to accept or oppose a plan. Rather, it's just a bunch of people that are more interested in changing plans and proposals just because they changed. It would be best for everyone if they change themselves.
As far as mini bus is concerned both governments have not done anything..same goes
for bus shelter..but when it comes to 20000crore projects like metro and mono rail
they keep their pen open to sign the moment it comes.
Regarding this expressway even during start of this project there was an article in this
newspaper about the road passing thru path that could get flooded..so need to have
this project in such a way that there are less problems.
Another important thing is this Anna arch.Pure politics by both on this and almost any issue related to Anna. Anna just ruled for 3 years and did not come to power on his own..just for garnering votes he is being misused.
Tamil nadu will never prosper, it like a kids game of blamming each one and the people are the one who suffers, can we get some people like Modi N to be our CM. who thinks the welfare of the people alone. We people dont want reason who is being lack of electriciy we need solutions.
One reason for this kind of neglect towards public projects like this could be, the thinking that after all the credits are going to the opposition party on completion and there isn't much to gain for the present rulers including "rewards" from the contractors! So, why waste any efforts. By putting it in cold storage, perhaps the blame would go the starters.
Politicians are public servents. They often forget that and bring ego to the fore. So much of tax
payers money has been wasted when Governement refused to move to new assembly building
just because it was built by the other party. So is when governement refuses to proceed with
Sethu Samuthiram project (after decades of study and support from center). As part of voting,
people should have a say on what is important and not just the ruling parties and their ego.
Irrespective of which party comes to power it should be a statutory
requirement to complete any and all infrastructure projects that are
in progress; otherwise, as succinctly pointed out in this article,
considerable wastage of the people's money takes place. There should
be accountability for all projects at all levels. Those officials who
propose a project under one Government should be held accountable for
dismissing or putting on hold the same project under another newly
elected Government. The first Veeranam project initiated in the early
1970s was a total disaster. To this day, I am not aware of any
Government Report analyzing why the project failed so spectacularly or
where all the project money went. The people are entitled to know
that.It is noteworthy that thanks to quick, easy and affordable
communications, facilitated by modern technology, the people at long
last are beginning to take note and ask rightful questions about how,
where and why their tax money is being spent.
Trust me, this will not change. Do not be surprised if Jayalalitha tomorrow makes a press release giving 10 reasons why all these projects had to be cancelled. Also, she will provide details on projects which were stopped by DMK when they came to power. Add to this list of projects stopped by Jaya - the brand new Secretariat built with our money. If she had her way, she would have stopped Metro Rail project as well. She is hell bent on making monorail happen just because she wants it, irrespective of experts view that it is not a practical solution for our city.
Those who are elected by the people should work for the people and by the people.
But nowadays , they rule the nations according to their personal will.
Public money , Tax money are not being utilized properly.
Politicians may not be knowing everything about the administrations / plans / economy road map etc. they come and go every 5 years.
what do the bureaucrats doing? we need to have an effective appraisal systems for the politicians and bureaucrats. Government should know that the tax is a hard earned money by the people.it should not be wasted.
The current Indian politics need have a complete overhauling.
Good comments by Ashok and Rajeev.
Very recently Amma lamented that KK government didnt allowed power projects which was initiated by her. "What a joke". Both of them wont suffer without power or road cogestion. People are the one affected.
Both Ms. Jayalalitha and Mr.Karunanidhi should realize, they do not have to start from scratch to tout acheivements, they will be praised and cherished if they would even let whats been started go on.
The sad truth for TN is that many many of the so called developments have come way too late and that too because of the necessity and not a futuristic view of either government.
Only two options ahead, either these two seasoned politicians should re-season (reason and season) or the common man should vote for third alternative - keep throwing all useless politicians off the ballot until we find some with common men in sight and thought. We can certainly find in more than a billion.
This is colossal waste of public money and tax payers hard earned money. This senseless politicians and bureaucrats take common man for granted and do what ever they want. But park their money in Switzerland while ruining our life and our basic necessities with their idiotic vengeance against other party.
Curse of India and curse of Indians.
Sad
Take a leaf from the US politics. No matter how divided they may be, when it comes to providing for the people, both parties come together to continue with whatever projects were started in each others tenure. In Tamilnadu they will never do anything for the people, except during the time of elections. Dr. Jayalalitha and Dr. Karunanidhi, could you please put your differences of opinion and help the people of Tamilnadu by continuing the projects. Once again take a lesson from the US elections.
This is the problem with our mode of governance, with our version of democracy, interlaced with the corruption that is part and parcel of all these activities.
Delays like these are bound to happen. What benefit does the existing government get for implementing a project started by the previous government? The greater public good? Ha ha - that's a joke. Common sense will tell us that there is no benefit, except to the opposition, for the existing government to complete any such project. Despite knowing this, we continue to do stupid things like changing the governing party every 5 years - how then will longer gestation projects get completed?
One solution, if corruption were not present to muddy the wters, would be to include opposition members in the organising committees for such projects, so it is a joint venture that each benefits from.
The other solution is to have a Singapore style of dictatorial democracy.
Chennai will never learn and I agree with what Ashok has said
This is just one example of how silly and senseless our politicians have come to be!
Obviously, public interest is just not in their minds! For us, it's a double-whammy owing to
lack of infrastructure and cost escalations (or cost incurred for nothing)!! As a matter of fact,
the half-built structures are a safety hazard that the government is willfully and deliberately
subjecting the public to.
Very good observation.I hope that the political leaders will have time to read and appreciate the sentiments.Unfortunately,our politicians of Dravidian parties are not sane enough to think logically.At least the government officials should be bold enough to defend their stand,irrespective of regime changes.
Instead of stopping, it is to expedited and enhanced. It is only govt.changes. State is there always. It is poor people’s money. Let politicians and bureaucrats understand and act.
Shameless TN government is doing all this by reversing everything done in the previous regime. The government can reverse everything but it will support freebies . Why didn't this government reverse all the freebies schemes because it will lose vote. Poor politics is taking toll.
Media should give more focus on issues like this instead of highlighting
how obama won in US.
That is the known style of this Govt. Simply because such projects
were initiated during Karunanidhi's period the present Govt. have
deliberately stopped them maliciously on some pretext or other.
Gone are those days when people join politics to serve public. Now
politics has become an occupation when you get huge money and power.
Sadly nobody thinks about the public welfare from whose money they get
their salaries. What puzzles me more is that despite seeing all this
atrocities we are paying our taxes every year. Shame on them.
The Chennai Port to Maduravayal elevated highway project is crucial to
disperse off the container trucks from entering the inner city
roads.In short it is a life line of tommorrow's Chennai. But each time
there is a change of government the project by the previous government
comes to a standstill motivated and fuelled by the presiding
governments ill intention(s). The incompleted structures are let to
rusts and rots under the sun and rain, wasting the hard earned tax
payers money. Nothing can change the mindset of the politicians unless
laws are enacted to make it complusory that all projects of the
previous government must be completed by the presiding government. The
government of the day should understanding one thing you are put in
office by people to work for their interest and for your self
motivated and precalculated hidden agendas.
As for as Tn is concerned whichever party forms a new Govt, not implementing old schemes and discontinuing on going projects is a big big problem. It is really affecting the state's progress. Hope leaders change their attitude towards public money and allow old projects to work.
Thanks to The Hindu for taking this initiative,the rest is leave to the learned public.
Another clear example of the two Dravidian parties holding the development of Tamilnadu to ransom to settle their personal scores.
unless the Dravidan parties learn to appriciate Good work irrespective of party differentiations TN wont grow in expected phase. Bottom line is only We the people are affected.
The writer has hit the nail right on the head. This seems to be a perennial problem with Tamil Nadu politics. Initiatives decided by one regime are conveniently forgotten by the next regime and the way, the see-saw of one party winning one election and the opposition winning the next, the people have to ultimately has to bear the unfortunate consequences
In this issue the mistake is on both government and the public. Why dint the public raise any voice against this halt. Also media which portaits many issues covering them day and night dint bother about covering this issue. I think protest by the people and continuous coverage of media on this regard may bring a good solution to this problem.
Its obvious right! The government which sanctions these new works at the
first place will utilize all the funds for their own well being rather
than the state. So when the next government comes, there is no money to
spend and hence the project gets shelved. Now the new government will
start a new project by getting the funds from the centre and the process
will continue...
This particular infrastructure project has become a encroachment of
coovam project. When one drives on Spur Tank Road, you could see how
the pillars have occupied the water body, which will be the main drain
of flood waters during heavy rains in North east monsoon.
When we all say "save the water bodies" when a lake is used as land
fill or polluted, why not we stop this projects coming up on the main
storm water drain serving the city?
May be its not politics at all! Nothing is so simple. First (as in
any detective novels) we need to see who benefits or who is hurt
(money loss) if this infrastructure is completed? Rest will become
clear.
This will stop only when tenders are issued based on competency of the contractors involved, rather than as favors to political supplicants.
This is due to mean mindedness of both present ruling party and the previous one.These people never have visions only ego rules them.Unfortunately court also not to the rescue of the public.We except court based on this Hindu report should intervene as in the case of school bus accident.Mobility of the city day by day suffers a jolt because of these tuklaq decisions.Crores of public money wasted on Anna arch demolition and now the flyover design changed with new design due to ego of single individual.Previous design without any signal now new design requires signal for traffic from annagar to Koyembedu and vice versa.
This is not the first time the projects are stopped for funny reason when the government change. Best example is Perambur rail over bridge, which was stopped when ADMK came to power later the project was completed with high cost by DMK government, even though lakhs of people suffered during monsoon seasons. There are project which are stopped by DMK party too. Parties have to think beyond party rivalry and profit they get from any project. The Hindu thanks for highlighting these project related news, i hope it get noticed by people and raise their voice against it. Need more RTI application submitted to reveal the truth.
I see the sinster desingn of the Government to malign the previous Government and extract more funds from the Centre through the delaying tactics.
The only remidy is to approach the judiciary against the central and
state governments and lay bare all the approvals obtained from previous
state government and how the present govt. raised fresh objections
midway.the waste of public money is a issue no one can ignore and the
inconvenience to public for no fault of theirs. a timeframe and deadline
can be prayed as remidy.Then the central govt. through shipping ministry
will enter in support of the petitioner.
The problem is simply hatred and if the present Government continue
with that project, it is ultimately previous one gets credit. We
should move away from personal vendetta and ultimately people's
benefit should be taken into account for everything as these
projects belong to general population and not that who become
rulers.
The political parties should realise that the welfare schemes need not be blocked as the scheme was initiated by a party while it was in power. Due to political reasons these schemes for which so much of public money already spent has been shelved/delayed and the public will become the losers. The elevated tollway which will easeout the already congested Bangalore Highway should be implemented early
Thanks Deepa. Your article inks what most minds of Chennai questioning
themselves silently. Thanks THEHINDU. Hope a change.
These kind of information should be constantly brought in the media...good Job Hindu team ..
Sadly this tragedy is avoidable but the egos of political parties and
the kickbacks wont allow. As always we the people suffer. We lose our
money (Tax), we lose quality of life (extra travel, delays, problems and
sometimes accidents) and we lose our progress.
Excellent , spot on write up on the current situation in Tamilnadu . Will JJ learn.
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