Jaipur, Oct 22 (IANS): The Rajasthan government on Monday approved the proposal for increasing the cost of Kalisindh Thermal Power Project (Unit 1 and 2) in Jhalawar district from Rs 9,479.51 crore to Rs 9,680.03 crore and issued directions to take action against officers and firms which delayed the project leading to its cost escalation.

Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot approved the finance department's proposal in this regard.

He further issued directions for taking administrative action against the state government officers and the private firm responsible for delay in project which caused the cost escalation. Work for establishing Unit-2 of the Kalisindh project could not start on the scheduled date in July 2014, which led to the increase in the project cost by about Rs 200 crore.

Now, responsibility of the government officers would be fixed for this delay, the CM said.

Similarly, responsibility of the concerned firm would be ascertained and the liquidity damaged would be charged for delay.

Later on, the amount collected on account of liquidity damage would be adjusted against the project cost to revise it.

The approved proposal for cost escalation also includes sanction for additional amount of about Rs 40 crore as the state share, which is 20 per cent of capital cost of the project. But, the state government would provide this amount within the limit of its share for the project cost allocated in the state budget 2019-20.

--IANS

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