NEW DELHI: Amid concerns over deficiencies in quality of works and premature failures in expressways and NH projects, the road transport ministry will engage a third party inspection agency (TPIA) for inspection and examination of around 5,000 km of expressways and highway stretches from the start of construction until project completion. The agency will initially be engaged for a period of three years.TOI has learnt that the ministry has decided to onboard Engineers India Ltd (EIL), an engineering consultancy under the petroleum ministry. The agency will audit mainly expressways, 6-lane and 4-lane NHs. At present, third party quality audits are conducted through independent quality auditors, who are mostly retired govt engineers empaneled by NHAI and other highway agencies.EIL had earlier carried out the task of third party quality check during the construction of Golden Quadrilateral, the country’s first flagship highway development programme that the then PM Atal Bihari Vajpayee had rolled out. In recent years increased instances of deficiencies in NH projects have become a cause of concern for authorities as these have attracted criticism from the public.Officials said that this was felt necessary considering the poor feedback from the independent quality auditors . As per the approved plan, the agency will be tasked to carry out inspection of 770 km of expressways, 2,200 km of 6-lane highways and another 1,000 each of NHs that are of four and two-lanes.Earlier this year, PMO had directed road transport ministry to introduce independent third-party audits to ensure high-quality work. Recently, at the monthly Pragati meeting, PM
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Narendra Modi had also sarcastically asked whether there was a need to go for a fourth party audit, raising concerns over the effectiveness of a third party audit.As per the plan, EIL’s scope will be “limited to inspection and examination” of quality works by verifying the compliance of technical specifications and standards as per contract. The agency’s technical personnel will conduct five inspection visits per stretch and will submit the report with recommendations for action.“Govt will bear the cost for such an exercise. The proposal is for institutionalisation of pro-active and extensive quality audits of priority projects at various phases of implementation and unlike reactive quality audits limited to complaints. The provision of five inspections across project life auditing different construction processes is expected to bring better results,” said an official.
