Karnataka government will release 50% of the pending bills of all completed works of Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP), Deputy Chief Minister D.K. Shivakumar has announced on Monday.
The contractors had stopped works in Bengaluru over the civic body not paying pending bills for the last 26 months and pendency touching a whopping ₹6,000 crore. The decision of the State has come as a breather to beleaguered contractors.
Four investigations
The government had constituted four special investigation teams to probe quality of works and other issues pertaining to civic works taken up under various departments. Earlier, Mr. Shivakumar had said that pending bills would be paid only after completion of this investigation, which the contractors had taken exception to.
However, the BBMP Contractors Association is not happy, as they think 50% would be a “paltry amount”.
Recently, Mr. Shivakumar had told the contractors that 75% of the bills would be released. President of the association, K.T Manjunath, talking to The Hindu, said: “The government had assured us of releasing 75% and now the announcement has come with 25% slash. The released amount will not help the contractors sustain, as they have to borrow money again if the government issues fresh tenders.”
On whether contractors will resume ongoing works, Mr. Manjunath said the association will hold a meeting and discuss the issue again with Mr. Shivakumar. Sources in the BBMP say that the government may successfully convince the contractors to resume work to keep the civic works, that has come to a standstill after the new Congress government came to power, running.
No clarity on type of works
While Mr. Shivakumar has said the government will release funds, there is no clarity on which funds will be released. There are three types of works - from BBMP, Government of Karnataka (GoK), and Government of India (GoI).
According to data shared by the BBMP, under BBMP works ₹3,256 crore is pending, under GoK ₹2,753 crore is pending, and ₹67 crore is pending under GoI works. The previous government had released over ₹600 crore for works completed under Amrutha Nagarothana Yojana.
