• ‘Infra projects hang fire, Rs 1,000cr dues pending’

    The Telangana government’s decision to tighten purse strings, post-demonetisation, has adversely impacted contractors who had taken up irrigation, road and other infrastructure works in the state.
    Addressing the gathering at the National Academy of Construction (NAC) campus on Wednesday , contractors sa id that dues worth a staggering Rs 1,000 crore have piled up over the last three years. The event was held to discuss the issue under the aegis of the Telangana chapter of the Builders’ Association of India (BAI), a body of engineering construction contractors.
    “When the TRS came to power in 2014, the chief mi nister had sanctioned a hu ge amount of money for in frastructure projects, all of which were kicked off at the same time. After demo netisation, it is contractors from Panchayat Raj and R&B who have been worst hit as we are not able to get loans from banks for these projects, after exhausting all our funds. To complete works, we need costly concrete machinery , tippers and other advanced equipment, which can’t be procured without ample funds,” said Soma Srinivas Reddy , Nalgonda chairman of BAI.
    According to B Sugunakar Rao, state chairman of BAI, while the state government had officially stopped giving them monthly payments since November, 2016, certain pending bills from as early as April and May , 2016, ha ve still not been clea red.”While the go vernment wants to de velop Hyderabad into a global city, it isn’t re leasing funds for the same. The state government has to release funds on a monthly basis and they have stopped doing so from as early as April last year. Not only are we unable to procure equipment to complete works, we are not even in a position to pay workers’ salaries. We need the CM to address contractors’ concerns at the earliest,” said Rao.Members of the association have now decided to wait till February 15, before taking further action. “If all payments are not made, all sanctioned projects will be hampered and will come to a standstill,” Rao warned. Ron Francis Womens Jersey

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