The Uttarakhand Government’s decision to stop giving construction contracts to Uttar Pradesh Rajkeeya Nirman Nigam Limited (UPRNNL) till the audit objections against it are cleared has severely hampered functioning of the State wing of the executing agency, said General Manager (GM) UPRNNL, Pradeep Kumar Sharma.
The agency has 14 functional units in the State which at present have 482 small and large projects under them. Following allegation of corruption against the agency, the State Government ordered an inquiry and a decision to stop giving new works to it was taken. Addressing newsmen here on Wednesday Pradeep Kumar Sharma informed this and said that recently the Managing Director (MD) of the company met the Chief Minister of Uttarakhand in which he proposed that the State Govt can undertake technical audit of the works done by the agency.
He said that the charges of scam made in a newspaper recently are baseless as the project where the allegation of Rs 800 Crore scam was made was of only Rs 804 Crore. Sharma said that the agency is presently undertaking 482 projects worth Rs 4500 Crore and most of them are 75 percent complete and if remaining budget is released these works would be completed till January 2019.
He said that the agency is operating in Uttarakhand from last many years and tag of outsiders given to it by some quarters is unjustified. The GM claimed that 80- 90 percent local staff and contractors are locals in the projects of UPRNNL in Uttarakhand. Sharma informed that the agency is working in 21 states of the country and has been appreciated for its efficiency and work quality. He said that the recently the state administration has taken a decision to release pending money for the project whose budget is less than Rs 5 Crores. UPRNNL has 384 such projects which come under this category. Sharma said that the agency is entrusted the task of construction of building of the Government Doon Medical College (GDMC). He informed that the total budget of the medical college s Rs 398 crore out of which Rs 259 crore is released. He claimed that the work of medical college is 80%complete.