Blacklisted contractors are back

HYDERABAD: Incidentally, four years ago, the GHMC had blacklisted some contractors for a period of two-years. But, now that the period has come to an end, they are eligible to participate in the bidding process.
The contractors R Anand, Vemula Srinivasulu, Irfan Ahmed, Ms/ Sri Laxmi WLCCS, Vemula Raju, Ch Raju Reddy, Kommula Laxmaiah and K Murali Krishna, were all banned from carrying out any civic work following multiple complaints."Now they are all back. The contractors who win the tenders to lay the roads use poor quality material. The longevity of the road depends on the material that they are using. In some cases we have noticed that the contractors use substandard bitumen mix, which lessens the life of the road," said a top official on condition of anonymity.There have been cases where contractors have substituted the recommended river-sand with fly ash to build cement concrete (CC) roads, another official added.
As a result, an astounding road length of 1,800 kilometres has been damaged in the city limits, and most of it is in Jubilee Hills, Banjara Hills, Ameerpet, S R Nagar, Hi-Tec City, Srinagar Colony and Madhapur."Two-weeks ago, the civic body had relaid the road on Road No 10, but it vanished faster than it was laid. Now, there are potholes everywhere," rued T Nanda Kumar, a resident of Brindavan Colony, who is forced to bear with the pockmarked roads everyday for his work-place commute.
While the GHMC is trying to shield itself by saying that it has blacklisted contractors who failed to adhere to the prescribed standards or complete the road-laying work on time, the condition of the roads speak volumes about quality control and also raises the question as how they get these contracts despite a dubious track record.
"There is lot of pressure on the officers from the corporators asking them to award the contracts to their kin," alleged Hanumanth Sagar.In some cases, the blacklisted contractors are using 'fake names' to win the contracts, revealed a source in the civic body. GHMC chief engineer Suresh Kumar said since the blacklisted period is over, the contractors are being chosen again. "But these are serious issues and we will probe and get to the bottom of it," he added.