Sourcing of potable water from Chenab Citizens’ Forum seeks probe into ‘tampering’ of original report

STATE TIMES NEWS
JAMMU: President of the Citizens’ Forum Jammu, R.K Chadha on Sunday appealed to Chief Minister, Mufti Mohammad Sayeed to initiate a probe into the formation of the new project report on sourcing of drinking water from Chenab for Jammu City. The forum chief also demanded that the original report be reassessed and implemented as it would save the state exchequer to a large extent.
Describing the change in project report as a deliberate attempt to tamper with the original report prepared earlier for certain vested interests, Chadha said, “Till 2012 the original project report on lifting water from Ranjan to Roop Nagar by gravity was never disputed. This report was prepared by Neeri Nagpur on the demand of Citizens’ Forum and got prepared on the instructions of Ghulam Nabi Azad, the then Central Minister somewhere around 1993-1994 with a project cost of Rs. 220 crore.”
According to Chadha, the original project as prepared by Neeri Nagpur was an excellent one that could have provided Jammu residents a good quantity of potable water that too with an affordable cost. He said that the report suggested water to be filtered at Ranjan on the bank of River Chenab, then by gravity to be brought to Roop Nagar and again by gravity to be supplied to Jammu City.
The Forum has, however, lamented that in 2010 all of a sudden the whole project was changed by the consultants who had conducted geo-technical feasibility study in 2009-10 and expressed their concern over the landscape of the area through which the pipes were to be laid to lift the water from Ranjan lift station near river Chenab. “This is publicly known to be expressed by the former Minister Taj Mohi-ud-Din”, Chadha maintained.
He said that it was very astonishing that the entire project was changed only in order to save the landscape of the area which is totally uninhibited and barren land. Chadha further expressed astonishment saying that the authorities concerned have acted like ‘Penny wise, pound foolish’ by changing the project, which if implemented, would cost eight times more to supply water to Jammu city. The changed project suggests water to be filtered at 70 metre downstream of river Chenab where an intake structure would be raised, and water would be taken at Gurah Pattan, about a km from this point and where a treatment plant be setup. From here the water is suggested to be brought by gravity to Muthi and from there be lifted to Roop Nagar storage tanks thus recurring expenses on lifting water from Muthi to Roop Nagar every day.
In 2002 when Mufti Sayeed became Chief Minister, Chadha said, he as president of Citizens’ Forum talked to him about this project. Mufti formed a committee of chief engineers under Shamiri and brought Rs. 320 crore for the project. But again this amount was used to construct Tube Wells around Jammu City and the project got scuttled after Mufti left the government.
Additional DGP (Retd) S.S Wazir, Advocate S.S Lehar, R.K Arun Sharma (Retd) Chief Engineer, R.K Handa (Retd) Vice Chairman JDA, Dr R Madan, Raman Samnotra, Secretary Jammu Club, S.R Sudhir (Congress), Gen Secretary of the forum Sanjiv Kerni, Nirmal Kamal (BJP), Manjit Manocha former Secretary Amar Singh Club, M.S Kapoor (Retd) Engineer J.S Chauhan, Advocate Aditya Sharma, Kewal Mahajan and Ramesh Gupta also supported the cause.