Third shitalakkhya bridge: 3-year project finally done in 12 years

Nine years behind schedule and costing 61 percent more, the Third Shitalakkhya Bridge is finally going to be opened to the public tomorrow.

Roads and Highways Department in November 2010 had taken up the project to establish a direct link between Narayanganj city and Bandar upazila.

It was supposed to be done by 2013 for Tk 377.62 crore, from Saudi Arabia.

The project authorities, however, took over six years just to hire consultants and contractors and the work on the ground began in 2017.

In the meantime, the project cost escalated to Tk 608.56 crore.

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina will open the 1.23km bridge to the public tomorrow.

Time extension and cost escalations are nothing new for RHD projects and it exposes its weaknesses in implementing such work.

A report of the Implementation Monitoring and Evaluation Division on 49 projects, completed in fiscal 2016-17, shows that 41 of them required time extension and suffered cost escalation.

Taking up projects without proper feasibility studies and estimation of costs, long delays in the tender process, and dividing project work into "small packages" to benefit influential but non-professional contractors are among the key reasons behind the delays, the report pointed out.

Delays in land acquisition, moving utility lines and frequent changes of project directors were also blamed for the poor show, the report said.

In the last fiscal year, RHD completed 44 projects but only three were done within their original deadlines. Most of the other 41 missed their original deadlines by more than two years. Some got delayed by three to four years.

WHY THE DELAY?

The Shitalakkhya river is between Bandar upazila and Narayanganj city.

The only direct road connection is through the Kanchpur Bridge (Shitalakkhya-1 Bridge), which currently requires nearly 30km of travel, according to RHD documents.

Once the four-lane bridge with walkways is opened to the public, people will have to travel less than two kilometres to reach Narayanganj city from Bandar upazila.

The Executive Committee of National Economic Council in November 2010 approved the project setting a cost of Tk 377.62 crore, of which 311.64 crore was supposed to be provided by Saudi Arabia as loan.

But the project faced different problems including frequent changes of project directors and officials and long delays in getting approval from the Saudi side, sources at the RHD said.

The current project director is the 10th of the project, they said.

Project authorities had to go through the tender process twice to appoint consultants and contractors.

After the second bidding, when the project authorities went for appointing the selected bidder, it was found that the Chinese company was banned by a multi-lateral lender, leading the authorities to go for the second bidder. The process also took time.

The Covid-19 pandemic and the slow flow of money from Saudi Arabia are the other reasons behind the delay, they said.

In the meantime, project cost rose to Tk 608.56 crore, largely due to the high cost of land acquisition.

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina laid the foundation stone of the project in February 2015 and the project authorities signed an agreement with the Chinese company Sinohydro Corporation Ltd in February 2017.

Once the bridge is in service, vehicles from southern districts would not need to got to the capital's Jatrabari to go to Chattogram, RHD officials said.

However, RHD must expand the existing road for establishing a better link, they added.