Centre yet to give Rs 2952 cr for Polavaram: Andhra Pradesh CM

AMARAVATI: Andhra Pradesh chief minister Chandrababu Naidu on Monday said that the central government was yet to release Rs 2952.71 crore to the state for Polavaram Project.
Holding a review meeting with the officials of the water resources department and the contractors on Polavaram Project and other irrigation projects in the state, the chief minister said that the government had spent Rs 8,294.97 crore of which Rs 5,342.26 crore was paid by the Centre and balance of Rs 2,952.71 crore is yet to be paid. Before it was declared a national project, the state government had spent Rs 5,135.87 crore on the project. This amount too has to be paid to the state by the Centre, he said and reiterated that the state has been asking for the early reimbursement of the funds in vain.

The chief minister reviewed the project works through drones and expressed satisfaction over the progress. He congratulated the officials and the contractors for completing 1 lakh cubic meters of spillway concrete works. He said it was a record performance and wanted the officials and contractors to continue the performance at the same speed so as to meet the deadline of 2019.

As May and June are dry months, and monsoon is expected to be in the first week of July, the chief minister wanted the officials to make the best use of the two months to speed up the works.

The chief minister also reviewed the progress of spill way, spill channel, earth work, power house works, diaphragm wall works, and the radial gates fabrication works, besides the right and left canals works.

Rs 1 crore donated

Meanwhile, Bekem Infra Projects Private Limited, who is handling the radial gates fabrication works of the Polavaram Project, donated Rs 1 crore to the Chief Minister’s Relief Fund on completion of silver jubilee of the company. Its chairman Bollineni Krishna Mohan and his father Purnachandra Rao handed over the contribution to the chief minister. They said that they were happy to be part of the Polavaram project, which was 100th project for the company.

Minister for water resources Devineni Umamaheswara Rao, principal secretary G Sai Prasad, water resources principal secretary Sashibhushan Kumar, finance secretary Ravichandra, engineer-in-chief M Venkateswara Rao and others were present.