DMK deputy leader Duraimurugan on Thursday questioned the inordinate delay on the part of the State government in implementing projects to tide over Chennai’s drinking water crisis.
Speaking in the Assembly, he read from the previous Budget speeches from 2011 to drive home his point that two desalination projects (with capacities of 150 million litres per day and 400 mld) and a reservoir at Thervoy Kandigai were yet to be implemented.
Municipal Administration Minister S.P. Velumani said foreign funding agencies like JICA and KfW were involved, and it was a long process. Opposition leader M.K. Stalin asked the Minister to give specific dates of the milestones in the project.
The Minister was granted time to give his reply. Later, he said one of the reasons for the delay was in obtaining environmental clearance from the Union Ministry of Environment and Forests.
Dwelling into the history of Krishna water, Mr. Duraimurugan, a former PWD minister, said the Thervoy Kandigai proposal had found mention in many budgets but was yet to become a reality. To this, Chief Minister Edappadi K. Palaniswami said 85% of the work on the reservoir to store 1 tmcft was over, but there was a court case on land acquisition and, therefore, the delay.
The government would be able to complete the work in about four to five months, he said.
From the last two years’ Budget documents, the government made it clear that it had dropped the Monorail project after talking about it for years and was focussing on Metro Rail Phase 2, Mr. Duraimurugan said.
On Krishna water, the Chief Minister said the creation of the new State of Telangana posed a new problem in getting the required quantum but the government was taking the necessary efforts.
Former Mayor and DMK MLA Ma. Subramanian asked the government to take a coordinated effort involving multiple agencies to control the mosquito menace in Chennai.
Admitting that the resistance of the mosquitoes to the chemicals had increased, Mr. Velumani said the government was taking efforts to control the mosquito breeding. Climatic changes and seasons make it difficult to control but the government was on the job, he said.
