2BHK works in Illuru raise eyebrows

Madhira: The State government’s much-hyped double-bedroom houses scheme might have fetched a lot of admiration for the ruling party but going by the quality of construction of houses in Illuru village in Madira mandal, the whole exercise appears to be a farce.  

A total of 40 2BHK houses were allotted in Illuru to be built in an area of two acres of land and the construction works began in February this year. Villagers raised a hue and cry as the construction looked substandard right from the beginning.

With a construction worker getting injured in an accident due to the use of inferior quality materials, locals took up a protest and staged a nine-day relay hunger strike seeking solution to the problem.

However, the villagers’ plea fell into deaf ears and the construction continued in the same fashion, albeit the contractor was changed. Shabby pillars, falling cement coats, tattered ceiling and shaky windows are now presenting a scary picture.        

It may be mentioned here that the government’s flagship scheme – free 2BHK houses for the poor – was announced with much fanfare in September 2015. The scheme aimed at providing shelter for every homeless poor with a budget of Rs 36,000 crore. 

The government committed to build 5.372 lakh houses. The cost of each house was estimated Rs 3.5 lakh per house initially. But it exceeded to Rs 7.5 lakh by 2017.  The government got an agreement with cement companies to provide cement at a lower rate than prevailing market rates as a social responsibility and cleared the bills through online payment.

However, the steel prices also increased three times over two years. The sand is being supplied free of cost to the builder by the government. Despite all these, the contractor is allegedly not maintaining quality of work.

Though quality check was done for namesake, the standard of construction has not improved. Executive Engineer S S A Ravi Kumar said the vigilance cell of the Panchayat Raj department probed into the matter and found out that the allegations about the poor quality of construction was correct. He added that there would be no compromise in quality of works and ensured that the works would be completed in time. 

By Ahmad Patan