January 23, 2003	Thursday	Ziqa’ad 19, 1423

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FAISALABAD, Jan 22: The provincial government has directed the Tehsil Municipal Administration (TMA) to entrust the project of carpeting 20 main roads of the city to the National Logistic Cell.

Sources in the TMA told this correspondent here on Tuesday that the Punjab government had been receiving complaints that development funds were being misused by contractors.

The TMA had recently prepared a plan to construct 38 roads including some important strips at an estimated cost of Rs500 million. The TMA sent the plan to the Punjab government for approval. However, the Punjab government rejected the plan saying that main city roads would be constructed by the NLC or the Frontier Works Organization.

The sources further claimed that a large number of projects for construction of roads and pavement of streets had been announced during the election campaign of Mushtaq Ali Cheema, brother of city Nazim Mumtaz Ali Cheema. However, the provincial highups forced the TMA to reject the tenders for all those projects and invite fresh bids.

The sources further revealed that the city Nazim had tried his best to get the contracts for construction of main city roads awarded to private contractors, but all his efforts proved futile when the Punjab governor directed that construction of 20 main city roads should be carried out by the NLC at an estimated cost of Rs300 million.

The TMA formally handed over the work on main city roads including the Mall Road, Circular Road, Kutchery Road, Jhang Road, Railway Road, Canal Road from Jhal Khaunana to Abdullahpur and Aminpur Bazaar Road to the NLC. According to the plan, Rs40 million would be spent on the Canal Road, Rs30 million on Circular Road and Rs10 million on Aminpur Bazaar.

Meanwhile, in a sudden move, the TMA awarded the contracts for the remaining 18 city roads on its own at an estimated cost of Rs22.3 million and directed the contractors to start work within a week. These 18 include the Jhang Road, Gulistan Colony Road, Ahmed Nagar Road, Garden Colony Road, Sohailabad Road, Community College Road, Maqbool Road, Malikpur Road, Officers Colony Road, Zainab Mosque Road, Al Fateh Grounds Road and Haseeb Shaheed Colony Roads.

It may be recalled here that former Punjab chief minister Shahbaz Sharif, despite strong reaction from the then mayor of the defunct Faisalabad Municipal Corporation, had awarded the contracts for construction of 32 highways and city roads to the NLC following complaints about misuse of funds.