Representational imageAlappuzha: Ever been enraged by the poor-quality patchwork repair work on the roads of Kerala? You have influential company.
Public works minister G. Sudhakaran put his words into practice when he pulled up his officials in Alappuzha and even ordered an immediate stop to a work he deemed to be crude.
The minister was traveling on the KSRTC Bus Stand Road in the town Saturday afternoon when he noticed the patchwork repair on the stretch. He got down from the car and summoned the department official in charge of the work. All the minister wanted to know was why the newly laid asphalt was not even half an inch thick.
The official tried to justify the work by saying that it only looked thin because it was a patchwork. Sudhakaran would have none of it. He ordered an immediate halt to the work and told the official to proceed only if he could get it done properly in accordance with the estimate.
He called up additional private secretary Chandran in Thiruvananthapuram and put him on the job to follow up with the public works executive engineer.
The minister was still not done. Speaking at a public meeting later in the day, he lambasted public works engineers and officials for their lackadaisical attitude in getting the work done. He said a section of officials refused to mend their ways.
He said the officials had none to fear if they were honest. He urged them to invite people’s representatives to monitor works on a road or a bridge. They would do good by convincing the elected representatives about the estimate and the actual work.
There were five officials right from the overseers to monitor a public work, the minister said.
Officials had to work with people’s representatives to ensure that the allotted funds were properly utilized in a project. He said he would step up inspection to to root out corruption from public works.
