Darjeeling BJP MP Raju Bista has raised questions about the quality of two multi-crore water schemes being executed in the hills and sought a central probe into the alleged corruption in the projects.

Bista has red-flagged the Atal Mission for Rejuvenation and Urban Transportation (AMRUT) for Darjeeling town and the Jal Jeevan Mission for rural areas of the Gorkhaland Territorial Administration (GTA). The two projects entail a cost of more than ₹14,00 crore and the expenditure is shared by the central and Bengal governments.

During his recent meeting with Union housing and urban development minister Manohar Lal Khattar, Bista raised concerns about various aspects regarding the ₹205 crore water project for Darjeeling.

Bista told this newspaper that the Centre had also approved ₹511 crore for Siliguri, ₹196 crore for Kalimpong, ₹210 crore for Kurseong and ₹170 crore for Mirik under AMRUT.

Work is under progress for the Darjeeling project that was approved in 2016. “If the quality of work in Darjeeling is not up to the mark and a quality assessment is not done, other projects (under AMRUT), too, will suffer,” said Bista.

The MP has asked the Centre to send a team of experts to check the quality of work in the Darjeeling project which is being executed by the public health engineering (PHE) department of the Bengal government.

“Twenty-three water tanks were constructed in Darjeeling without conducting hydrodynamic and geotechnical studies, which raises concerns as Darjeeling is located in seismic zone IV,” said Bista.

Bista specifically raised allegations against the chief engineer, municipal engineering directorate (north zone). “The chief engineer, municipal engineering directorate, north zone, has continued to subvert any investigations into these projects (with regard to the structural integrity of the water tanks),” said Bista.

He said the entire process adopted for the execution of the Darjeeling project was faulty. Bista said unqualified consultancies had been hired for the preparation of the DPR (detailed project report), which was done without a site visit and approved though it was faulty.

“Besides, open e-tender norms were subverted and work orders were issued at higher rates,” said the MP.

Chitaranjan Barman, chief engineer, MED (north zone), however, said vested interests might have misinformed Bista.

“The MP might have been misinformed by vested interests. The design and its stability had been vetted by Jadavpur University and we are simply supervising the project,” Barman told The Telegraph.

Bista also sought investigations into the ₹1,200 crore drinking water project under the Jal Jeevan Mission, which is being implemented in the Gorkhaland Territorial Administration (GTA) area.

Bista met Union jal shakti minister C.R. Patil on Wednesday and informed him about the “massive corruption” in the water project in the GTA area.

“I informed him about the fact that the ‘Jal Jeevan Mission’ projects in the region are being developed, managed and implemented by a separate division of PHE created by the West Bengal Government – Neorakhola W/S & MTC Division, in collaboration with the Gorkhaland Territorial Administration (GTA). The said agency has created the DPRs for “Har Ghar Jal” projects in our region without making any provisions for identifying the source of the water,” read a written statement by Bista.

The MP also alleged that almost all DPRs of the Jal Jeevan Mission only dealt with the laying of pipes and the construction of storage tanks and it had come to the fore that there were no provisions to identify water sources and clarity lacked on how water would flow from the sources to the tanks.

“Further, the Bengal government has failed to develop any monitoring mechanism for the project,” said Bista.

A senior GTA official said many of the water sources were in forests. “The process to seek permission and no-objection certificates from the forest department has started and stage 1 work has been completed. This is why pipes are being laid and storage tanks are being built initially,” the official said.

The official added that depending on ground realities about the water sources
and according to the field requirements, changes were made in the DPR which
were approved by appropriate technical authorities.