A week after the showcase Airport Express Line, India’s first metro rail network under public-private partnership, came to a grinding halt, the blame game between Reliance Infrastructure and Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) continues.
The rift became public with the accusatory letter to the Union urban development minister from DMRC Managing Director Mangu Singh being leaked.
In it, he has reportedly accused the concessionaire, R-Infra, of allowing the situation to “worsen to such an extent that services were required to be suspended”.
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The problem was with the construction of civil structures for the line and DMRC concedes this was its responsibility. However, it blames R-Infra for negligence in inspection.
“DMRC has never denied that construction and civil works was its responsibility, but R-Infra was not conducting regular inspections. They were doing it only when instructed by us and that, too, after we had written seven letters,” a DMRC official told Business Standard.
Defending itself, an R-Infra executive said, “In the letter, Mangu Singh has himself clearly accepted the flaws in the construction work. And, this was DMRC’s responsibility.”
The inspection work on bearings had to be done once a year, detailed inspection once in five years and replacement works once in 15 years, he noted, and they were complying with this schedule.
“DMRC is trying to deflect the focus of the public as they themselves faulted in construction,” he added.
Singh’s letter also said Reliance was trying to find an excuse to walk out for not being able to run the line in a profitable manner, wanting DMRC to either take over or financial restructure the project.
According to the contents of the leaked letter: “As I have already brought to your notice, Reliance, even prior to this issue of damage to the bearings, had represented to DMRC about the financial viability of the project and had in fact written to DMRC in this respect. They had expressed that either DMRC take over or restructure the entire project so that the financial burden on them is reduced. Meanwhile, they were able to find this issue of bearings and suspended the services.”
Responding, the R-Infra executive said, “DMRC is trying to shift the focus from safety to finances. We now suspect DMRC’s ability to ensure the supervision of the construction work and we have now started detailed inspection.”
The executive added a joint inspection team of Delhi Airport Metro Express Pvt Ltd, under the leadership of the Railway Board, had even found broken girders on the line, apart from bearings.
According to Sudhir Krishna, secretary to the ministry, “The joint committee under the railways has submitted an interim report and the final report is expected early next week. The report will just look into what needs to be rectified in the line and the reason for the defects.” Fixing the responsibility is outside the purview of this report and would be done in a different one, he said, adding that an end-to-end check of the line was desirable.
