The City Municipal Corporation has decided to take over the construction of electric crematorium in Meyyanur after the Rotary Club of Salem Electrical Crematorium Trust expressed its inability to carry out the project due to financial issues.
The trust had in 2012 proposed to establish the city’s first electric crematorium on 1.6 acre at a cost of Rs. 3.5 crore as a joint venture project with the Corporation.
The civic body had provided land, proposed to construct drainage and create light facilities on the site while the trust was vested with executing the project.
The trust members proposed to collect funds from the public for the project. The land was handed over to the trust on March 22, 2013 and was registered in the sub-registrar office in Suramangalam.
However, except for the construction of compound wall, no work began and the Corporation’s letter asking to initiate the work yielded no result.
Though the project was proposed to be completed in one-and-a-half years, there is no progress in work.
In December 2014, the Corporation received a letter from the trust stating that it was unable to execute the work in the present financial position.
Hence, the Corporation decided to cancel the transferred land agreement with the trust and also retrieve the land. Also, the Corporation decided to complete the project at a cost of Rs. 1.80 crore with funds from Infrastructure Gap Filling Fund.
A resolution to this was passed in the recent council meeting.
The Corporation officials said that the project details would be submitted to the Commissionerate of Municipal Administration, Chennai, seeking permission and for sanctioning funds.