CHENNAI: After complaints about the construction quality of the 864 housing board tenements at K P Park, Pulianthope, the tender process adopted by the Tamil Nadu Urban Habitat Development Board (TNUHDB) has come under the scanner.
NGO Arappor Iyakkam’s Jayaram Venkatesan, who filed RTI queries on the issue, says the replies reveal corruption began at the tender stage itself. Only one contractor had qualified for the financial bid violating tender transparency norms. The cost of construction was also much higher than market rates.
“The tender for the construction of the building with 864 houses, each 400sqft in area, was invited on October 3, 2017. On November 7, 2017, the tenders were opened. The financial bids were opened on November 15, 2017. RTI replies revealed that only one contractor had qualified. As per the tender transparency act, the TNUHDB should have cancelled the tenders. But the contract was handed to PST Engineering Construction at 4% more than the market rate. The payment made was Rs 91.81cr,” he said.
The people staying in the older building were vacated for the new building to be constructed. There were several other violations such as the tender not being online. The documents had to be downloaded and submitted manually. The market rate for construction is Rs 1,800 per sqfeet. But the TNUHDB paid Rs 2,602 per sqft. This resulted in a total loss of Rs 27.7crore. And substandard construction has further increased the loss by 30%. IIT-M that studied 25 samples from each block found failure in complying with plastering specifications.
The cement to sand ratio for the ceiling should be 1:3 and for the wall 1:5. Only 5% of the samples contained the specified ratio. Only 11% of the samples adhered to plastering specifications. The concrete strength of block B failed to meet the specifications. The report further specified that they couldn’t check the nonstructural items as they were not even part of the tender. “How can the organization not specify all items in the tender for such a huge project,” asked Jayaram Venkatesan.
The fire and rescue department, the superintendent engineer monitoring the construction, third party agencies should all be probed for these lapses, he added. The NGO has written to the DVAC seeking a probe into the matter.
