The Minister for home, rural development, and Panchayati Raj, Pritam Singh pulled up the Government engineers of Uttarakhand for not utilising their full potential and depending on private companies for consultancy in most of the engineering projects.
The Minister was addressing the inaugural session of Workshop on bridge design and construction for eight World Bank funded States on Tuesday.
He said that a tendency has set in the most of the engineering departments of the state to get the works like Detailed Project Report (DPR) and other activities of projects done by the private consultants. Singh said that such was not a case previously wherein the engineers of the State Government did all the work from conception to completion and all of the structures of that time have proved their worth.
The Minister exhorted the engineers to realise their full potential and plan and execute projects on their own. He said that engineers should take benefit of the vast experience of Dr VK Raina who is a world famous expert on design and construction of bridges.
The Minister regretted the fact that many bridges in recent years in Uttarakhand have collapsed either during construction or shortly after completion.
He said that the bridges are very important engineering structures for a State like Uttarakhand and their collapse brings loss of money and invites criminal cases against those associated with their construction.
The additional secretary, PWD and Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Pradhan Mantri Gramin Sadak Yojna (PMGSY), Arvind Singh Hyanki also raised concern over 100 per cent dependency on consultants.
He said that the bridge sector is very significant for a state like Uttarakhand and our engineers should learn modern technologies and latest developments in this field. Hyanki accepted that the bridge sector is somewhat neglected in the state and advised the participants to make full use of the workshop. He asked the senior officers of PMGSY to organise field training for the participants of the workshop.
The Chief Engineer PMGSY, A K Dinker said that states prefer to take loan from World Bank for projects as it not only gives financial help but also provides technical expertise for them.
He said that the representatives from Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Himachal Pradesh, Meghalaya, Punjab. Jharkhand and Bihar are participating in the 15 day workshop. Five engineers from each of these states are participating in the workshop.
Renowned bridge expert, Dr V K Raina said that the workshop would exhaustively cover all the aspects of structure, design, construction and quality control about bridges.