Pvt company told to finish water project by March.

City corporation commissioner J Sravan Kumar has directed French firm Suez India Pvt Ltd. to speed up the implementation of 24x7 water supply project at RS Puram and set a deadline of March to complete the work.

A source with the city corporation said, “Once the work is completed, we will supply water round the clock for a few days to assess the quality of work. During the trial period, important components of the project, including water pressure, will be checked.”

The firm had started implementing the project at RS Puram on a pilot basis in January 2019. The work involves replacement of both the main feeder and distribution pipelines that are in bad shape.

“The existing water distribution system has cast iron, PVC and asbestos pipelines. As part of the project, the existing pipelines would be replaced with ductile iron pipelines of various diameters ranging from 75mm to 500mm,” the source said.

The source said they had proposed to replace the pipelines for about 60km and that 75% work was already completed. “We are speeding up the work to meet the deadline.”

Pointing out that the firm would also replace the 15mm galvanised iron pipelines that are used for household service connections with 20mm HDPE pipelines, the source said they had already replaced around 4,000 of the 5,600 household connections.

While the region is categorized into two district metered areas – north and south zone – the control room work may not be completed soon. “Until then, water consumption by each consumer will be assessed manually.”

The source attributed the delay in completing the project to the delay in obtaining no-objection certificate (NOC) to execute the project on highway roads. “While we had managed to obtain NOC from state highways to dig up Thadagam Road, Marudhamalai Road and Cowley Brown Road, the firm is yet to obtain NOC from national highways wing of state highways to carry out work on Mettupalayam road.” The pilot project was expected to be completed before September 2019.

TOI