Kerala - Thiruvananthapuram   

Work on flats resumes at colony

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Construction work on the Basic Services to Urban Poor (BSUP) slum improvement project at Kannamoola Puthenpalam Colony has resumed, with the City Corporation putting forth a proposal to issue Kudumbasree linkage loans to the project's beneficiaries to help them remit the beneficiary contribution.

The project's implementation agency, Habitat Technology Group, recently resumed works ending a five-month-long stalemate between project officials and beneficiaries who had earlier expressed their inability to pay the contribution.

The beneficiary contribution of the project is around Rs.23,600 for those in the general category and Rs.18,000 for Scheduled Caste category beneficiaries. Corporation officials said that the issue had cropped up after the beneficiaries were ‘misled' during the last local body election campaigns that flats under the scheme could be allotted to them without remitting the contribution.

“However, the Corporation has made it clear that beneficiary contribution is an important component of this BSUP scheme. It has to be remitted by all beneficiaries,” said Corporation works standing committee chairman V.S. Padmakumar. “So far none of the beneficiaries has paid this amount or signed agreement with the Corporation. However, now they are willing to pay the amount,” he said.

115 families to benefit

The Rs.2.86-crore BSUP project at Puthenpalam Colony includes construction of 23 blocks of buildings with five flats each. As many as 115 families in the colony will benefit from the project.

Kannamoola ward councillor Kumari Padmanabhan said that the present proposal was to avail linkage loans to the beneficiaries through Kudumbasree. “Earlier the beneficiary contribution of such housing schemes could be met through wages, by involving the beneficiaries in the construction work. However, this scheme insists on contribution in cash,” she said.

The BSUP construction works in the colony had also suffered a setback following reports of poor quality construction. The issue was aggravated after keys of first batch of 20 houses were handed over to beneficiaries during the first phase inauguration in August 2010, before the flats' finishing works were done. “It was only a token gesture and the keys were recollected after the function. It is not possible to officially hand over the keys as none of them had remitted the beneficiary contribution. Besides, only the structural works of those buildings were completed and the finishing works are still pending,” Mr. Padmakumar said. He added that the Corporation has not received any official complaint from beneficiaries regarding the quality of construction.

Habitat project engineer C.M. Krishna Kumari also refuted reports that the group had abandoned the project mid-way following the controversy over quality of construction. “We have not completed works on any of the flats so far. The inaugural was held soon after the completion of structural works on seven blocks. The complaints raised were about unfinished flats. Once we complete the works there will be no scope for complaints,” she said.

Phase I in two months

Ms. Krishna added that the first phase of the project, which includes construction of 35 flats (seven blocks), two anganwadis, two libraries, a study centre and a health centre, would be completed in two months.

Delay in paying pending amounts to the agency also hampered work. Mr. Padmakumar said that the dues would soon be paid since the Corporation had got a Central allotment of Rs.5 crore under the BSUP scheme.

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