Congress workers and local residents Saturday held a protest at the Sony World Junction on 100 Feet Ring Road against the delay in the construction of the Ejipura Kendriya Sadan flyover. Congress leader Ramalinga Reddy said, “We protested against the BJP government and the BBMP (Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike) to demand the early completion of the Ejipura to Kendriya Sadan flyover. The Congress government at the Centre had to build an elevated flyover to connect east Bengaluru and south Bengaluru in 2012-13, with funds from JN-NURM (Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission). After the JN-NURM scheme was abolished, to fund this project from the state government, I personally approached former Karnataka chief minister Siddaramaiah.” “In 2017, the foundation stone was laid by Siddaramaiah, and the contract was awarded to M/S Simplex Infra Ltd. December 2019 was the deadline for completion of this project. Until 2018, during our tenure, work had progressed well on schedule and up to 32 per cent of the work had been completed. During the BJP government, sufficient funds were not released from the allocated grants. M/S Simplex Infra Ltd had written many letters to the BBMP highlighting this issue, but the funds were never released, which delayed the completion of the project,” he added. Reddy said he wrote several letters to Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai to expedite the project. “Despite several meetings and joint inspections conducted on-site with successive BBMP commissioners, no concrete results are obtained. We protested earlier, too, and I have also raised this issue in the Assembly Session. Since there was no positive response to any of the above initiatives, a local resident filed a PIL before the Karnataka High Court which ordered the cancellation of the contract awarded to M/s Simplex and ordered the government to call for fresh bids. “Two bidders were… technically disqualified but one bidder qualified. As of yet, no decision has been taken by the BBMP on the bid submitted, further delaying the project,” Reddy said. He said that since 2019, the state government has executed only 10 per cent of the project work. Reddy also raised the issue of the non-completion of Ejipura-Agara Link Road.
