Not all is well with Imphal Sewerage Project
Monitoring exercise compromised, fear for the worst hangs heavy
Source: The Sangai Express

Imphal, June 01 2011: Amid growing apprehension that the works at the Imphal Sewerage Project may have been short changed at crucial points, there is the looming possibility that the project itself may be rendered untenable when the time comes to commission it.

To ensure quality control, which is indispensable for a highly technical work like the Imphal Sewerage Project, close monitoring of the work coupled with re-checking of the works especially related to the time the pipes are laid, is mandatory, said a source while talking to The Sangai Express.

However, it has come to light that no such re-checking exercise was conducted at many points when the pipelines were laid, added the source.

The specification was precise, said the source and added that at the time of laying a pipeline, a slope of 3 mm should be maintained over a distance of every one metre.

In case there is any depression in the area, pumping stations should be erected to support the pipeline before another set of pipeline is laid.

However as the number of contractors engaged to construct the Sewerage Project was too many, close monitoring of the work was compromised.

The huge number of contractors also meant the break down in co-ordination among them, which created a situation where everyone did as they pleased and trenches were haphazardly dug up.

In such a scenario, technical lapses cannot be entirely ruled out, said the source further.

Significantly, though the Government of France had provided the required material to conduct the checks and recheckings, wherever necessary, most of the equipments have not been utilised.

Among the equipments provided for checking the works on the project, Total Station equipment has an attached camera to detect possible technical lapses after the pipe is laid over a distance as well as to monitor the level of the trench just before filling up the trench with cement.

The trenches being dug up are also to be used as inspection chambers where a camera can be lowered to inspect possible technical lapses between two inspection chambers so that necessary rectification can be made at the earliest possible.

However, apart from utilising the camera in some selected inspection chambers at Uripok and Watham Leirak area, no such inspections have been carried out in other places.

Although necessary equipments for timely checking on the implementation of the project being taken up with France Government providing all the required materials have been provided, the equipments have not been utilised.

Similarly, at the time of covering up the trenches with cement, the SOs concerned of the department concerned conducted the required checking/inspection in some areas only.

Moreover, when the survey was carried out along with a team of engineers from France, it was done so according to the norms being followed in France.

So, when work actually started on the project here, there came many instances when the norms followed in France could not be applied here.

Given this situation the survey report had to be discarded.

Even though the engineers of the department have left no stone unturned to ensure proper implementation of the project, there is still the need to go in for a proper rechecking before it is commissioned.

Comment