Indian Infrastructure: The Same Old Story

By: CaraTan   Date: 15 July 2009

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Cara Tan, editor

 

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Delhi, India, 15 July 2009. The Delhi metro was supposed to be the best-run project in India, an example of the new modern infrastructure that would transform the country. In reality, it is an example of the corruption, greed and incompetence - the same old India but with more money.

Six died in this collapse

Indian Infrastructure Collapse Picture

On Sunday, a major accident happened, due to safety measures being cut to save construction costs, according to Saugata Roy, of India's Ministry of Urban Development.

Initially, the designers of the metro, Delhi Metro Rail Corp. and its consultants, were supposed to hand the project over to the various different contractors to do the construction. However, the design and the construction ended up being done by the same firm.

"That was given up in phase two mainly to save money," said Mr. Roy, in reference to the handover to new builders.

"Now this accident has happened," Mr. Roy continued, "we'll have to rethink whether the same people should be designers and contractors."

The accident occured when a bridge under construction for the Delhi metro fell, killing six. Then, during the cleanup the next day, a crane flipped over, which only served to confirm doubts about the overall safety of this important infrastructure project.

This comes about a week after India released its 2009-2010 budget, with infrastructure development being one of its key initiatives.

Road Transport and Highways Minister Kamal Nath said the appropriate authority must assign responsibility for the accident. "It is for the appropriate authority to fix responsibility," Nath said when asked whether one of the construction companies, Gammon Infrastructure, was to blame.

Nath said that the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) is the appropriate authority.

"DMRC is an efficient and an outstanding corporation. But technological failures do happen sometimes, they happen all over the world. It is something to be regretted, it is something from which a lesson can be learnt...In way we should look at it as a setback."

Ishan Mohan, a Delhi resident, took the matter more seriously, "When you're dealing with corrupt and lazy lawmakers, along with equally corrupt and greedy companies, what do you expect? These deaths are the price paid for corruption."

Dwayne Ramakrishnan, EconomyWatch.com

 


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