the goan I network
MARGAO
With the ambitious Margao sewage project lying grossly under-utilized for want of takers, PWD Minister Deepak Pauskar on Tuesday warned that the government will have no option than to disconnect water supply to the households not taking sewage connections.
Leader of the Opposition, Digambar Kamat further suggested to the PWD Minister to take a policy decision, wherein the PWD must connect all households and recover the expenses through water bills.
During an interaction with the media on Tuesday, the PWD Minister expressed his unhappiness over the status of the sewage connections in the commercial capital.
“I have been told that out of 40,000 households, only around 9000 have connected their buildings to the sewage network. The figure is very low compared to the infrastructure that has been put in place by spending crores of rupees,” he added.
Saying that the government will leave no stone unturned to get as many households connected to the Margao sewage network, Pauskar said a meeting of the various agencies executing the project has been called next week to take stock of the situation.
“We want to hear from JICA, Sewage corporation as well as PWD the status of the project. I would like to set a deadline to complete the project in Margao,” Pauskar
added.
Leader of Opposition Digambar Kamat who was with the PWD Minister, said the problem could be resolved overnight if the government connects all households and then recovers the expenses from the people through water bills.
The Margao MLA pointed that efforts to convince and persuade households to obtain sewage connections has not met with great success in the commercial capital.
“I feel that the very purpose of the project will be defeated if even a single household, which does not take the connection discharges his sewage in the open. To tide over the problem, the only option for the PWD is to connect all households to the network,” Kamat added.
Meanwhile, the PWD said that hotmixing of all roads in the state would begin from the first week of December. He said the government has sanctioned most of the files and the remaining files which have been moved for hotmixing will be cleared soon.
On the traffic congestion on the Cortalim-Agassaim road because of the ongoing Zuari bridge, the PWD Minister said the representative of the bridge contractor will be called next week with a request to take steps along with other agencies to ensure smooth flow of traffic on the busy road.
