Sewerage and drainage infrastructure of the capital is heading towards a big mess as the two prominent stake holders, the Road Construction Department (RCD) and Ranchi Municipal Corporation (RMC) have decided to go ahead with the construction work of drains in various parts of the city without weighing the utility of the project vis-à-vis the proposed sewerage-drainage system for Ranchi.
The Ranchi Division of RCD is spending Rs125 crore for constructing roads and drains along all the prominent streets of Ranchi, however, the justification rests on assumptions rather than backed by a documented vision in the backdrop of the State Government’s proposal to create a massive sewerage-drainage system for the capital. However, the immediate objective, as the RCD asserts, is to address the problem of choked drain and prevent drain water from overflowing on the roads under its authority.
“We are building drains on the existing slope so there will not be any problem as the flow of water will be towards the treatment plant that will be built under the proposed sewerage-drainage system. The spending is 100 per cent justified as the smaller drains of RMC falls in our drain and our drain water will be channelised towards bigger system,” said Executive Engineer, RCD, Ranchi Division, JP Singh.
Even though the proposed sewerage-drainage system lacks clarity about the planning part, the RCD claims the execution of its ongoing drain construction as fitting whatever designs that will be prepared in future to route city’s dirty water in a planned manner. Interestingly, the department confesses to keep the entire sewerage-drainage plan conceived by the RMC in focus before giving a green signal to the present construction works which will widen drains on the major roads in one-year’s duration.
“The sewerage-drainage system is likely to be built as per the existing system so we are not doing anything which will become defunct. We held regular meetings with Town Commissioner and have always participated in meetings called for the proposed system,” maintained the Executive Engineer.
Meanwhile, the network of drain proposed by the RMC will be completed in two phases but the project is silent about incorporating the existing and upcoming drains into the larger sewerage-drainage system.
“As such there is no plan to link drains to the proposed sewerage-drainage system. The proposed system will come up in Zone-1 and it will take two years to execute it. Right now the town is in pathetic condition so drain has to be made,” said RMC PRO, Naresh Kumar Sinha.
The RMC sanctioned construction work for 74 roads and drains in the first phase whereas tender for construction of 80 drains is likely to be floated by the municipal corporation in the second phase. The mammoth work of widening and constructing new drains would be accomplished at an estimated cost of Rs5 crore which was sanctioned by the Urban Development department in the concluding financial year.“Work has not started as the selected agency has to obtain work order,” added Sinha.
Even the undergoing construction work being undertaken by Public Works Department is overly focused on providing convenient exit to water flowing out of residential, commercial apartments and rainwater to a bigger drain that finally ends in a river rather than channelising the sewer water to a path that would end up in a centralized treatment plant of a grand sewerage and drainage system. The divided responsibility of the city’s network of drains adds to the woes of the pathetic condition of city which is accentuated by the missing coordination between the PWD and the RMC.
“We have no say in their (PWDs) work. The project related to drain could not be linked to the proposed system as we need to assess the two components of the planned system—the storm water system and the sewer line—to do anything,” told Sinha.
The RMC’s enthusiasm about providing relief from overflowing drain dissipates in the absence of a rationale for going ahead with tons of spending on piecemeal measures fictitiously related to the proposed grand system for flushing and treating capital’s sewer water. The loopholes in the planning to ensure drains flow even when the big-ticket project would start is yet to be addressed as the tender process for second phase of construction is underway at the RMC’s office. Yet, the civic body claims to have a roadmap for how the loosely connected network of drains would be incorporated into a grand design for a drainage system.
The proposal of sewerage and drainage system has stuck in red-tapism from quite some time. According to the proposal, the city was divided into four zones—1, 2, 3, 4— and the entire proposal was expected to be funded by central government and Japan International Cooperation Agency. Although the Central Government released Rs302-crore for
Zone-1 the Japanese agency withheld its decision to provide soft loans for executing rest of the project as the state government failed to select agency for the project. Notably, funding for Zone-2, 3, 4 (Rs900-crore) was split between the state government and the JICA in the ratio of 66:33.