Rs 1.2 billion ‘filtered’ down the drain?

Some 500 filtration plants, costing over a billion rupees to the national exchequer and meant to ensure provision of potable water to the people in Sindh, have become non-functional due to negligence and apathy on the part of authorities concerned, Pakistan Today has learnt.
President Asif Ali Zardari’s first initiative for provision of clean drinking water was launched by the Environment Ministry as the Clean Drinking Water Initiative project in July 2004.
Later, the project was reassigned to the Industries, Production & Special Initiatives Ministry and renamed as the Clean Drinking Water for All (CDWA) project in April 2006.
Under the revised PC-I for the CDWA project, as approved by the Executive Committee of the National Economic Council in February 2007, some 6,584 water filtration plants were to be installed, one in each union council (UC) of the country.
In Sindh, the CDWA project started functioning since January 16, 2008 through the City District Government Karachi Public Health Engineering Department director general who was designated as the CDWA Project Implementation Unit’s provincial director.
The federal government had awarded the Green Power Business International Development Company with a contract on November 5, 2007 for installing 1,005 water filtration plants at a cost of Rs 1.2 billion.
Sources claimed that the material used by the contractor for the water filtration plants was not in accordance with the bidding specifications it had earlier provided.
After inspecting a demo plant installed at Qasimabad, Hyderabad, the Sindh Project Monitoring Unit issued a report that said the plant was not according to the specifications mentioned in the contract agreement.
These observations were communicated to the contractor for removing the plant’s deficiencies and it was asked to install one plant of each design in every urban and rural UC of every district in Sindh so that the models in each category of these plants could be inspected and approved by technical and administrative authorities in the preliminary stage before the contractor could be allowed to install more plants.
However, nothing was changed and the contractor was cleared all the payment, even though officials had identified the locations where the plants are not on a par with the agreed upon specifications.
These locations include ST-10, Five-Star Chowrangi Complex, Block-2, Mahmood Ghaznavi Park, Block-16 and Jamal Colony Pumping Station in Gulshan-e-Iqbal, Minara Masjid Ground Azizabad No 8, UC office Block-3 Federal B Area, Gulberg Park, ST-8 Block-12, Federal B Area and Farzana Dawakhana, Dastagir No 9, ST-10 Masjid Nauman, Afghan Stadium and UC office Alnoor Society in Gulberg Town, Pumping Station 7 and 8, Muhammad Shah graveyard, North Karachi and Sector 11-A Buffer Zone opposite Masjid Mustafa in New Karachi, near Hill Park area in Jamshed Town, besides Hilal Ahmar dispensary, Qasimabad Park in Hyderabad, in front of UC office in Khairpur, Noor Khan Chandio house (Kotdiji), Water Works Gunderio, LSR-Najam Lashari, Khura Road (Gambat), Boys Higher Secondary School, Zarai Taraqiati Bank, Ottaque of Ghulam Rasool, Dargah Sachal Sarmast and Village Mehar Ali Khairpur, Jail Garden near Railway Culvert No 3 Old Sukkur, Car Parking Shaheed Ganj, Kandhari Chowk, near Minara Sabeel besides stairs, opposite Mustafa Hospital, tonga stand and near MPL Dispensary New Goth in Sukkur City, and Qureshi Village near Girls School Main Chowk and village Lal Mashaikh Chowk on main road in Sukkur (new), High School Nadir Shah Mohalla Ratodero, Eidgah near Old Post Office Mohalla Ratodero, High School Park and near UC-4 office in Larkana-Ratodero.
Sources said since no authority has taken any interest in the report, some 500 water filtration plants in almost all the districts of the province have become non-functional since the past couple of months.
The Public Health Engineering Department has constituted an inspection team for the filtration plants that would submit its report after visiting the sites, the sources added.