It has come to light that 32 of the 34 multi-split AC units installed at the Central Library in Panjim had stopped functioning in 2019. Worryingly the same vendor who had installed the units in 2011 has been re-awarded the work of fitting new AC units, the work order is worth a whopping Rs 2.1 crores.
The party had not honoured the regular service schedule / preventive maintenance clause which was part of the earlier contract resulting in 32 units going defunct at great cost to the rare books stored in the library.
The present tender is in itself flawed since it only covers replacement of the old AC units, there is no mention of supply and installation of a new refrigerant piping system in place of the old one which has been severely corroded.
All this has come to light only after the High Court of Bombay at Goa took suo motu cognizance of the state of affairs at the prestigious institution.
Under the Public Libraries Act the Goa government had collected Rs 21 crore as cess last year to maintain libraries but no one knows where and how the funds were deployed.
We need a dedicated team of domain experts to restore the Central Library, if left to the politicians it will become another Smart City Panjim fiasco.
