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Work on Godavari bridge at snails pace
Its high time the government and the contracting agency focussed on completing the high-level bridge across the Godavari river that connects (NH-63) Gudem in Adilabad and Rayapatnam in Karimnagar district, a crucial inter-district link.
Adilabad/Karimnagar: It’s high time the government and the contracting agency focussed on completing the high-level bridge across the Godavari river that connects (NH-63) Gudem in Adilabad and Rayapatnam in Karimnagar district, a crucial inter-district link.
Although it has been five years since the construction of the bridge has begun, for various reasons the project works appeared to be moving at a snail’s pace.
Considering the necessity of replacing the six-decade-old low-level narrow bridge, the Central government has sanctioned a high-level bridge in 2010-11.
Though the project cost was estimated at Rs 30 crore initially, later it was escalated to Rs 53 crore due to delay in commissioning of the works. Thrice the tenders were cancelled due to technical and other reasons. Finally, the work was clinched by GVR Group in 2011.
Since then the project works have been moving at a slow pace despite the fact that the vehicular movement on the old low-lying bridge is precariously continuing. The locals say that the dilapidated bridge may collapse at any time.
The vehicular movement comes to standstill whenever Godavari is in full flow or the water from upstream Kadem dam is released. The bridge comes under a sheet of at least 3 feet of water during the floods. This apart, the bridge is also being submerged in the backwaters of Yellampalli project.
The inundation of bridge is forcing the road users and the vehicular traffic, coming from eastern part of Adilabad district which has strong business links with Karimnagar district, to take the longest route – Luxettipet-Mancherial-Godavarikhani-Karimnagar – to cross the Godavari.
The commuters either side of the Godavari – Rayapatnam and Gudem - have to travel more than 100 km whenever the bridge is inundated. Though the delay in works was attributed to the contractor initially, of late the backwaters of Yellampally are holding up the progress of the bridge, it’s learnt.
Speaking to The Hans India, the Executive Engineer (National Highways Circuit) G Ravinder said: “With the level of Yellampalli backwaters being reduced considerably, the works of new high-level 1.2-kilometer bridge are likely to be completed by May-end.”
The contractors have laid a passage to move in crane to erect gutters, he added. When this newspaper tried to contact a representative of the contractor, he refused to comment on the works. But official sources say that if the bridge is not completed before the onset of monsoons, people have to wait for another year to see the bridge in operation.
“The shaky old bridge may go down any moment,” Srikanth of Gudem and A Ramesh of Karimnagar said, demanding the government to take measures to complete the new bridge as early as possible.
