The Comptroller and Auditor General has flagged a Rs 922 crore cost escalation in Mumbai’s Coastal Road project due to an “unjustified” design change, The Times of India reported citing a draft report by the auditing body.

The CAG is the watchdog of the state exchequer and is responsible for auditing government accounts to ensure proper use of public funds.

In 2023, following requests from fisherfolk operating out of Worli Koliwada’s Cleveland Bunder, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation agreed to alter the design of a bridge connecting the Coastal Road to the Bandra-Worli Sea Link.

The change involved increasing the distance between two supporting pillars of the interchange bridge, from 60 meters to 120 meters, to allow safe passage for fishing boats. This required the construction of an expensive “bow-string” feature that led to the cost escalation, reported The Indian Express.

“The increase in the width of the span was not justified as there were differences in opinions of the experts from time to time,” the newspaper quoted from the CAG report, which was submitted last July to the chief engineer of the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation.

The first phase of the Coastal Road, a 10.5-km stretch linking Nariman Point to the Bandra-Worli Sea Link, was opened to the public on March 11, 2024. Prime Minister Narendra Modi had inaugurated the project a few weeks earlier, on February 19.

The CAG report states that the project was inaugurated prematurely, before crucial “testing and commissioning” works were completed and before “operation and maintenance” works could be established during the defect liability period, The Indian Express reported.

The defect liability period is the window in which a contractor is responsible for rectifying any defects that arise in a construction project after its completion.

The CAG report also mentions that water seepage was detected in the southbound tunnel of the Coastal Road in May last year, only three months after its inauguration. The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation chose to opt for a temporary fix by injecting cement into the cracks.

“Seepage or leakage of water from these expansion joints needs explanation as this may have been caused due to inferior quality of construction,” The Indian Express quoted from the report.

The report also highlighted that some contracts were handed out without inviting tenders, in violation of municipal and state government guidelines.

“The department without accessing competitive rates for the aforesaid work from existing and experienced contractors…had to allot the aforesaid work directly to existing contractors at very little negotiations on the rates quoted by them and provided them with an undue advantage,” the report is further quoted as having said.

“We have put forth our views in the submission and pointed out that there are several aspects in the report that are not correctly presented,” a Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation official was quoted as saying by The Indian Express. “They [CAG] assured us the inclusion of our statements and we are hoping that the report could be closed by them.”

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