MLA UT Khader takes Contractor to Task for Poor Quality of Road Concrete Work in Manjanady-Ullal

MLA UT Khader takes Contractor to Task for Poor Quality of Road Concrete Work in Manjanady-Ullal

Mangaluru: There’s no such a thing as the perfect concrete mix. There are many well-designed concrete mixes for a given application, but some are better than others. Good concrete depends on good aggregate. It’s rare that all locations in a quarry produce the same quality aggregate. There are areas of higher and lower quality, so quarry management must constantly test to find the right quality material. And these days, it also depends on the engineer and the construction company who undertake the project. A good engineer and the good contractor will see that the work is done systematically by using the right materials for the work, while a bad engineer and bad contractor will do a unscientific work, and such projects will not last long.

Good concrete depends on the right blends of quality ingredients, but the actual making of the concrete is very important, too. You need good equipment to get consistent quality. It’s important that the producer has good control of water additions and can get the proper blending of the materials. Every ready-mix company should have a quality control program and at least one full-time person responsible for it. You can’t produce good concrete without this step. Unless you monitor and test each material used to make concrete and check the product just before placement, you can’t know if you are meeting the requirements and being consistent. Good concrete is the result of a partnership between a quarry, the ready-mix producer, and the contractor placing the concrete. But responsibility for the final quality and durability falls on the contractor. But unfortunately this procedure is not done here, and that’s the reason we see some unscientific and bad quality of work.

But lately we have seen such kind of unscientific and careless work in carrying out the work, either a road construction or a drainage or footpath work-where cheap quality of materials are used to swallow money into their pockets, thereby put the motorists or the pedestrians in danger. And here is one example which was noted by the public and complained to their area MLA, and quickly the MLA swung into action by visiting the spot and taking to task the contractor for a cheap quality of road construction work.

A concreting work of road was taken up near Manjanady Panchayat under Ullal Constituency, which is a KRDL project under special grant of Rs 15 lakh for concreting the road. But the contractor had done a bad work, where the concrete mix comprised more of sand and jelly stones, than the cement. And due to the heavy rains couple of days ago, has totally ruined the unscientific cheap quality concrete work, resulting in waste of money. If you look at the video you will come to know how cheap quality of work was done, in order to pocket in money.

MLA U T Khader who visited the spot yesterday, 13 June, had warned the contractor to rectify the issue, by using the right mix of ingredients for a strong concrete mix so that the road will last long, if not face action.