Minutes of the meeting of NRRDA, JMDC and all the states for Pilot Project on Jute Geo Textiles, experience sharing on the Rural Roads.
Date & Time: 03rd June 2009, 10: 30 AM
Venue: Tagore Hall, Scope Complex, Lodhi Road, New Delhi
The meeting was presided over by Shri J.K. Mohapatra, DG, NRRDA and the representatives of JMDC headed by Shri. Atri Bhattacharya, Secretary(JMDC), representatives of CRRI headed by Dr. Sudhir Mathur,representatives of Jute Technology, Kolkata headed by Prof. Prabir Roy, Representatives of the state of Assam, Andhra Pradesh, Arunachal Pradesh, Bihar, Chattisgarh, Jammu & Kashmir, Jharkhand, Haryana, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Orissa, Rajasthan, Sikkim, Tamilnadu, West Bengal and officers of MoRD and NRRDA were present during the meeting.
Shri J.K. Mohapatra, DG, NRRDA welcomed the officers and gave his opening remarks about the use of JGT in Rural Roads. He expressed his concern for not taking projects with new and innovative technologies and locally available waste materials which will have a bearing on cost effectiveness. Further, he also welcomed proposals for pilot projects from any sate and indicated the support of NRRDA/ MoRD in this regard.
Shri Atri Bhattacharya, Secretary, JMDC presented the advantages of using JGT Technology in road construction and slope protection and urged the states to promote the use of indigenous material, that will have an impact on farm sector. He identified key areas of coordination and assured the support of JMDC in all future projects to overcome any problems in supply line.
Dr. B.P. Chandrasekhar, Director (Technical), NRRDA, presented the status note on the Pilot Projects using JGT, including initial hurdles and hurdles during execution. He also wanted to know the preparedness of the states for scaling up the use of JGT.
A Technical presentation was made by JMDC on the details of the Pilot Project and its implementation. The following issues were discussed and decisions taken.
A presentation was made by Dr. Tapobrata Sanyal of JMDC on the problems encountered in execution and monitoring the progress of these pilot projects. He is of the opinion that better attention of the concerned PIUs and support at SRRDA might have helped in expediting the project completion of the pilot project roads. It was informed that out of total 10 roads 6 roads have been completed, 3 are nearing completion and 1 road is to be dropped.
A technical presentation on the use of JGT Technology was made by CRRI, headed by Dr. Sudhir Mathur. The technical and operational details of the use of JGT were explained in detail. Details of performance evaluation of two of the completed roads were also presented by CRRI.
Representatives from the states implementing the Pilot Projects shared their experiences of execution of these projects.Most of them have expressed that there were lot of gaps which could have been addressed at the time of project preparation and taking the concerned PIUs into confidence right from the DPR preparation stage, would have helped in resolving several technical and operational issues and project might have been completed much earlier. They also brought the key issue of support in the supply chain of the JGT, particularly from JMDC.
In the open house, technical queries raised by representatives of different states were replied by officers of CRRI and JMDC and issues related to overall management were replied by NRRDA.
Following decisions were taken:-
- Interim specifications for use of JGT Technology in rural roads will be prepared by CRRI in consultation with JMDC and will be made available within a month’s time.
- States willing to use JGT Technology should prepare analysis of items based on interim specifications.
- It was decided with the consent of the states that proposals of minimum length as detailed below, will be prepared using JGT Technology, by the states while bringing the next batch of proposals to NRRDA / MoRD for clearance.
Arunachal Pradesh / About 30 km / PM Package
Chattisgarh / About 50 km / ADB Project
Madhya Pradesh / About 50 km / ADB Projects to be considered by Empowered Committee on 19.06.09
West Bengal / About 100 km / Bharat Nirman
Assam / About 100-150 km / ADB III
Bihar / About 50 km / Bharat Nirman
Sikkim / ------/ For Slope Protection Works
Secretary, JMDC in his concluding remarks expressed JMDCs readiness in streamlining the supply line for the JGT to all the states, wherever the projects are taken.
DG, NRRDA in his concluding remarks set targets to different states, as stated above with their consent and clearly brought out the need for preparing quality DPRs with due diligence, readiness of PIUs in adopting new technologies and the state SRRDAs to facilitate visit of the pilot project roads for engineers from other states.
Meeting concluded with vote of thanks to the chair.