Poor response to tenders floated by PMU of WB project
Srinagar: The much-talked about hydro-meteorological action plan for Kashmir has hit a roadblock due to poor response to tenders floated by the Economic Reconstruction Agency (ERA) for procurement of equipment for the mega project.
Under the World Bank financed project, the Economic Reconstruction Agency (ERA) proposed to set-up integrated operational forecasting system for hydro-meteorological hazards like flood and drought in Kashmir.
The ERA is Project Monitoring Unit (PMU) for stproject unveiled by the World Bank in 2015 for reconstruction of infrastructure hit by the devastating deluge of 2014 and strengthening J&K’s disaster management mechanism.
As part of the plan, the PMU planned to install 11 automatic water level recorder stations(AWLRS) on river Jhelum and 23 on its tributaries.
The programme also envisaged installation of 13 automatic rain gauges in various catchment areas of the river for recording and communicating the real-time rainfall data.
It also proposed to set-up 20 acoustic doppler profilers to record and communicate the real time discharge of Jhelum at nine stations and of tributaries at 11 stations.
According to officials, J&K ERA floated tenders for supply, installation and commissioning of equipment for the project, but it got poor response.
“The tender issued by PMU JTFRP for implementation of hydrometrological action plan received response from a single firm. Since the said firm was found to be technically non-responsive, the tender hereby stands,” read documents accessed by The Precious Kashmir.
It is worthwhile to mention that the WB sanctioned Rs 1500 crore for reconstruction of infrastructure hit by 2014 floods and strengthening State’s disaster management capabilities.
After the floods, a team of WB visited the affected areas of the State between February 1-6, 2015, to carry out a multi-sectoral assessment report of the damages and needs. The project was to be completed by June 2020 but the World Bank extended its deadline by one year on request of PMU. The J&K has again approached the Union Finance Ministry and World Bank for extending the deadline of the project to June 2022.
