The agenda of not using NITTTR's consultancy for the city roads' recarpeting and only availing the facility for quality control was discussed in the General House meeting held on Saturday.
Emphasising on the revocation of the civic body’s decision to avail NITTTR’s consultancy at a cost of Rs 30-35 lakh for providing road recarpeting specifications, Municipal Corporation Chandigarh Commissioner Anindita Mitra questioned the rationale behind hiring the consultants when the MC already had in-house engineers.
The agenda of not using NITTTR’s consultancy for the city roads’ recarpeting and only availing the facility for quality control was discussed in the General House meeting held on Saturday.
The MC officials informed the councillors that most of the specifications issued by the NITTTR were were not in accordance with the manual of the CPWD and the Municipal Corporation had to change them to comply with the manual.
“Moreover when we already have qualified engineers, why do we need consultants? Yes, we can get the third party quality control work done by them but not the consultancy on road work—preparing estimates and all,” Mitra said.
She added, “The work of preparing estimates should be with the officials. Moreover, I have been told that NITTTR had not given the estimates as per the CPWD manual and engineers had to change all of them in conformity with the manual.”
The agenda discussed at the meeting specified: “Consultancy services being provided by the NITTR and the corresponding charges were reviewed during the meeting held under the Chairmanship of WICMAC on August 30, 2021, and it was observed that huge expenditure is being incurred on account of consultancy fees, which will further increase with the length of road and it was felt that the efforts should be made to cut down the expenditure. Since MC Chandigarh has its own full-fledged Engineering Wing, with well-qualified engineers who can easily oversee the recarpeting requirement of the city roads as per MORTH specification/IRC guidelines, no such specific inputs are required. Hence, the services of the consultant for deciding the thickness of the overlay at such huge cost are not
appropriate.”
It further added, “In case the consultancy is required for some specific/particular project of new construction, then the same will be considered accordingly. However, the consultancy of NITTTR as third party quality control consultant, during the execution of work, would be beneficial… Further, it has also been brought to notice that NITTTR has provided consultancy as per scope of work mentioned for estimates approved in 2019-2020 and 2020-2021, and payment has been made accordingly after receiving consultancy.” It was also specified that the move will help in cutting down additional burden.
“It is submitted that amendment of MoU may be considered to cut down the expenditure, keeping in view the budget constraints, and it is proposed that the scope of work for consultancy services of NITTTR be curtailed and limited to quality control as per charges and scope.”
The house also reviewed the exit clause which mentioned that amendments will be done by mutual consent of both the parties and the MoU will be cancelled with the consent of both the parties on giving a notice of at least three months.
“The existing MOU may be amended as per provision of Clause 12, with the mutual consent only in the interest of quality assurance of recarpeting works with effect from January 2022. In case if the NITTTR is not willing to amend the MoU then the same will be cancelled as per the provisions of Clause 13 of MoU. However, if any consultancy with specific inputs is required in future, a separate proposal will be approved from competent authority,” it was specified.
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