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Friday, June 24, 2011

Shoddy construction leaves CCCT with crumbling campus

ANAND OBEROI
GANGTOK, 23 June: Arguably the best in the region [as far as academics is concerned], CCCT, the polytechnic college at Chisopani in South Sikkim is a casualty waiting to happen. The 19 acre campus housing 8 blocks to reside 235 students and 56 staff members has developed severe cracks, is held up by compromised columns and has peeling concrete in all buildings.
Precariously standing on cracked supporting posts, the buildings here are in a sad state of disrepair with no alternative at hand for the administration which was handed over the complex in 2006 by the Human Resource and Development Department. For a construction which is barely five years old, the scale at which it is crumbling away is shocking.

What is disturbing here is the obvious negligence on the part of the HRDD which has clearly admitted that “no material testing for the civil infrastructure was done by the engineering cell of the department” when it took over the property from the contractor commissioned to do the work. The HRDD response was against an RTI filed by one Ragap Chettri on 08 June 2011.
The concerned department, it may be informed, had commissioned the construction to a private builder, SIMPLEX under the consultancy of NBCC and funding by SBIU under a World Bank Project.
The RTI application had asked “whether the civil infrastructure (buildings) situated at Chisopani conducted material testing by experts of the HRDD before taking in from the contractor?” The answer from the HRDD Joint Director’s office was, “No”.
Similarly, the second question asked by the applicant was, “What did the HRDD have to say on the quality of the construction of CCCT?” The department replied, “The department has nothing to say on quality of construction.”
“The entire complex has developed cracks. The administration has tried its best with some patch-up works but then the cracks reappear. The window and door frames of the buildings have started to fall apart. The main posts holding the structures are all cracked and the walls seep water when it rains. The balconies at the employee quarters are on the verge of collapsing. There are slight cracks developing on the stairs also. The more these repairs are delayed, the worse it will get,” said KN Chettri, manager administration when NOW! enquired after the situation at the campus.
It may also be informed that the institute’s auditorium is one of the worst hit with cracks and peeling of wall plastering. The terrace of the residential buildings are also in a deplorable state with most of the plaster eroded and water now seeping into the rooms below.  
“We are pressing for funds and grants and are waiting for the government to disperse funds. Since September 2006 nothing has happened regarding repairs,” the management here informs.
The question here is how the HRDD took over the complex without even checking the quality of the civil works and how it also over-looked the need for water supply to the complex. And this, when they have an engineering wing and was a mandatory inspection which had to be given clearance before taking over was carried out.

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