Contractors working with power development department Tuesday complained that the department has not released their payments for past more than nine months.
The contractors said they are working under Restructured Accelerated Power Development and Reforms Program (R-APDRP) scheme launched by the government of India through PDD.
They said that Kolkata based company ‘EMC Power Limited’ had bagged the contract in 2014 under the scheme and had hired them for installing transformers, etc.
“We are around 200 contractors who are working in different districts of Kashmir from 2014. For past one year we haven’t received a single penny. We have taken loans from banks and are failing to pay monthly instalments,” said Sameer Ahmed, a contractor.
“Due to the callous attitude of both the PDD and the EMC Power Limited, our families are suffering. We have met many officials in this regard but our pleas to resolve our problem have fallen on deaf ears,” he said.
The contractors said the PDD and the EMC Power Limited “are passing the buck at each other when it comes to releasing our pending payments.”
The contractors said that around Rs 9 crore payments are pending.
PDD Chief Engineer, Naseer Ahmad Khan, who heads R-APDRP project, told Greater Kashmir that the Kolkata based company faced penalties from the government due to non-completion of project and the “liabilities were absorbed in penalties” and that is why these contractors are not able to receive their payments.
“They were supposed to finish the project in 2 years but they couldn’t even after two year extension was given to them. The payments that were pending were not released due to penalties. The company has approached the government in this regard, and the file is with the government”, Khan said.
“The project time has already finished and now the company wants the penalties to be quashed, government is yet to take a call on it and we will respond to the issue accordingly”, he said.
The contractors said they are made to suffer for none of their faults and no one is paying heed to their problems despite several protests by them.
Despite repeated attempts, company vice president Prashant Manhas could not be contacted as his number was continuously not reachable.