JNNURM progress update report

Excellent find sir! Read through the whole report and here are some more observations:

Part II Progress at City Level:
1) Good progress seem to have been made in accounting (except that is is a year behind), property tax (49% to 85% coverage rate against 90% requirement) and user charges.
2) Lacking in the above that either JNNURM should ask or is being asked but not provided. Or, atleast provided to the public:
    i)   Service standards / quality - noticed for waste management but not for any other area. Needs to be comprehensive.
    ii)  Technical standards - adherence to codal provisions. Eg: Underpass width, accessibility, footpath width/efficiency etc.
    iii) Criteria for selecting projects; justification included. Example: streetlight locations (not required both sides of road), underpass requirement/traffic studies etc.
    iv) Minimum warranty provided by bidders; feasibility of the projects.
    v)  All important inspection, maintenance schedule.
    vi)  Accountability in schedule. Being asked but needs to tightened.

Part III Monitoring Project Implementation sections
3) Pages 114 to 216 seem to be similar to (or more likely a repeat of) pages 9 to 113.
4) Project completion dates are delayed without exception.
5) The reasons of the delays are as below:
   For storm water drain / valley remodeling (reproduced below):
   "
   i)   SWD project, some of the components in the DPR cannot be taken up.
   ii)  Unhygienic conditions prevailing to take up work.
   iii) Not appointed PMC for this project till date. "
6) Makes one wonder; don't they know at the project conceptualization stage that the areas will be unhygienic? Why are no project managers appointed?
   For grade separators:
   i)  Malleswaram underpass shows up as completed.
   ii) Tagore  circle underpass - "Project not started due to non-co-operation by the public. MLA intervention is sought. Issue is being solved.
  iii) Problem of land acquisition has led to delay. Working condition is unhygienic. Since it is over storm water drain, work gets slow or stopped at times due to rain.
  iv) Land acquisition, traffic diversion and un hygienic work condition (over storm water drain)
  v)  Delay in completion is due to problems associated with traffic diversion etc.,
  vi)  Sital conditions (faced hard rock which has to be blasted), traffic diversion are the reasons for delay. And another major problem is land acquisition.
 vii)  Traffic Diversion and utility shifting has led to delay.
 viii) The main work has not started due to involvement of lot of tree cutting and problem of land acquisition, utility shifting
"
7) Clever play of words in not indicating actual completion date for MVM underpass ;-)
8) All of the above should be fairly well-known at the planning stage and should definitely be known by the firm bidding for the project (how can they bid without knowing reality?).
9) Utility shifting may be legitimate based on lack of cooperation from other agencies or incorrect data.
10) Sadly, all capacity building programs, workshops and other initiatives are NIL. This is one of the reasons for the poor project management and quality.

Looks like BBMP is being held accountable "publicly" (published on website) for the first time. May be they have provided reports to elected representatives in the past but they were not readily accessible to the public. Now, if the JNNURM officials have good competency, they will point out deficiencies and solicit rectification for the next year. Also, praja/public can ground-verify percentage completion for projects. All in all, may lead to better time and project management. Can always hope ... :-)