CSMC undertakes task of desilting 72 nullahs in 43 days!

Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar:

A total of 43 days are remaining before the commencement of the monsoon season. However, the alert citizens are worried and their eyebrows are being raised as to how the municipal corporation would be able to desilt and clean up 72 nullahs including 18 big ones in the city before starting of the rainy season or by the end of May.

The desilting of nullahs before monsoon is an every-year process of Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar Municipal Corporation (CSMC). Earlier, the desilting contract was outsourced to a private agency, but the then municipal commissioner Om Prakash Bakoria stopped the practice. Instead, he set a trend of performing the task through civic personnel. This is saving crores of rupees.

This year, the municipal corporation started desilting nullahs, but the work done is not up to the mark. It is alleged that the cursory work is done.

There are 10 big nullahs whose condition is very pathetic. They are filled up with all types of garbage and silt, apart from the encroachment. All these factors are stopping the natural flow of rainwater in these nullahs.

There are 15 organisations and societies which had constructed multi-storeyed buildings upon nullahs but had not desilted them. The nullahs at Dalalwadi and Paithan Gate witnessed storming of drain water inside the houses of people staying nearby.

The CSMC has set the target of completing the desilting of all nullahs by May end. The works have been started one week ago. Meanwhile, the ward engineers claimed of having completed 30 per cent work, so far. The CSMC has provided one JCB for the desilting of nullahs in the jurisdiction of each zone. If desilting through JCB is not possible in some nullahs then the municipal corporation is deploying labourers to remove the silt from them. There are around 100 workers, it is learnt.

The city engineer A B Deshmukh reviewed the progress of desilting nullahs on Monday.

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CSMC saves Rs 4 crore

The CSMC executive engineer B D Phad

said, “The desilting of 72 nullahs of length 116 km have been started using municipal corporation’s JCB, pocelain, tippers and labourers recently. Every zone office would be increasing the strength of labourers and the machinery as per their need to complete the task at the earliest. Our plan is to complete the task by May end. The municipal corporation is saving between Rs 3 crore and Rs 4 crore by not outsourcing the desilting contract and doing on its own. Moreover, the work is also of quality compared to the private agencies working in the past. There was no complaint of rainwater storming in the houses of low-lying areas in the city during last year.”