- Govt nod for floating tenders
- First Published : 19 Jan 2010 01:39:00 AM ISTLast Updated :
- PALAKKAD: The Water Resources Department has given the nod to float tenders for the Kunnamkattupathy drinking water scheme, intended to benefit more than 50,000 residents of Perumatty and Pattancherry panchayats.
- Of the total Rs 4 crore estimated for the project, Rs 2 crore will be allotted from the Accelerated Rural Drinking Water Scheme of the Central Government, and the rest from the Chittur block panchayat. The block has also received administrative sanction to use the Backward Region Grants Fund.
- Drinking water is one of the biggest problems of the two panchayats near Chittur.
- Plachimada, which housed the Hindustan Coco Cola Beverages, is also in Perumatty panchayat. The new water scheme, which has been entangled in numerous bureaucratic delays, will benefit 29 Scheduled Caste colonies and 37 Scheduled Tribe colonies in Perumatty panchayat and four SC and 48 ST colonies in Pattancherry.
- The scheme, which envisages pumping out water from Kunnamkattupathy, storing it in overhead tanks and supplying it through pipelines in the two panchayats, received administrative sanction way back in 2003. Though tenders were floated at the time, the bids were 40 per cent above the estimate, which the Water Department did not approve. Subsequently, Perumatty grama panchayat president Risha Premkumar, district panchayat member Adv Murugadas and former president A Krishnan met Additional Chief Secretary K Jayakumar, who was chairman of the Kerala Water Authority. Jayakumar, as head of the committee set up by the government to assess the damages caused by the Coca Cola plant, visited Plachimada and was convinced of the need to implement the scheme.
- It was after this visit, things started moving faster. Pipelines have already been laid from Kannimari to Plachimada.
- In summer, when the Coke unit was functioning and for many months after its closure in 2004, the company used to supply drinking water to the residents in tanker lorries. Subsequently, it was discontinued.
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