Secy Planning holds extensive deliberations with WB team on JTFRP works

SRINAGAR: Secretary, Planning, Development & Monitoring Department, Aijaz Asad today held extensive deliberations with the visiting World Bank (WB) team in the presence of other stakeholders about the way forward to complete the ongoing works of Jehlum-Tawi Flood Recovery Project (JTFRP) on time in a meeting at Civil Secretariat here.
Principal GMC, Srinagar; Chief Engineer, R&B (Central); Technical Director, JTFRP; SE, R&B, Srinagar; Executive Engineer, ERA besides other concerned officers were also present during the meeting.
At the outset, the Secretary expressed gratitude towards the WB team members who had been on a visit to UT for the past three days to take on a spot assessment of progress made on the projects funded by it.
He assured the members that the commitments made earlier would be met in letter and spirit. He simultaneously directed the field functionaries of the executing agencies to further speed up the pace of work to complete these projects well ahead of their deadlines.
The Secretary further called upon the concerned officers to ensure that most of the unspent funds are expended for creating the critical infrastructure envisaged under this multi-crore project as these are of critical in nature.
He also stressed on seeking the necessary permissions, clearances or certificates for the smooth running of several of the projects taken under JTFRP. He called for aligning all the parameters with that of WB guidelines so that there is no incoherence between the two regarding the culmination of each of these works.
The Secretary further discussed the ways and means of spending saved amount on other critically significant works. He sought the assistance of the team in turning some of the proposals into reality as these are highly essential for disaster mitigation or connectivity of the far-off areas in the UT.
The projects as well as key components that came up for discussion during this meeting include Bone & Joint Hospital Srinagar, Emergency Operation Centre, Dewatering Stations, four bridges, Additional block of LD Hospital and other technical/audit issues.
It was given out in the meeting that a total of 213 projects were taken up under JTFRP at a total cost of US $ 250 Million. Out of these 189 projects (89%) stand completed and 19 are currently under different stages of progress with a financial disbursement of US $179 million till date.
It was also revealed that these projects include raising different critical infrastructure projects, generating livelihoods and capacity building of the people here in the UT.