State Planning Board member and Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) Principal Adviser E. Sreedharan has called for reforming the functioning of the Public Works Department (PWD).
Addressing a meet of PWD engineers here on Saturday, he termed the Roads and Bridges Development Corporation of Kerala Limited (RBDCK) a ‘miserable failure.’ The public sector undertaking should be ideally headed by a competent engineer, he said.
“Fund shortage in the agency must be overcome by tapping the non-lapsable Central Road Fund derived from the cess on the sale of petroleum products. The State stood to receive around Rs.400 crore a year. The fund could be used to build 49 rail overbridges and 40 underpasses sanctioned to eliminate level crossings,” he said.
ADVERTISEMENT
Mr. Sreedharan proposed bringing down the number of non-technical staff in the department. “The PWD must emulate the DMRC and the Konkan Railway where there are no clerical posts. Ideally, most positions in the department must be held by engineers who know the ground realities,” he said.