Firm that installed them has stopped services as it hasn’t been paid Rs 3 crore due to it for over one year

BBMP

The city may have topped capital cities in the country for cleanliness and ranked an impressive 7th in the Swachh Bharat list of all cities, but that may soon be a thing of the past. The blame for this will squarely fall on the organisation that is supposed to make all the difference to the cleanliness upkeep of Bengaluru.Swachh Bharat ratings are based on two important criteria, open defecation and solid waste management practices. Slipping up on either will result in drop in ranking, and that’s the way things seem to be moving here. Around 46 electronic toilets that are designed to use very little water and thus to be environment friendly, apart from curbing open defecation, have stopped functioning.Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike () has held up payment to the agency that set up these eToilets across the city, leaving the agency on option but to stop operations. According to Eram Scientific Solutions Private Limited, the civic body has defaulted payment of a whopping Rs 3 crore to the agency for almost a year now.Eram was entrusted by BBMP to install 75 eToilets in the city, 46 of which it did. The agency submitted three sets of invoices to BBMP for the work that it had completed. Even after a full year of submission of the first bill, no payment has been made so far, leaving the company with no choice but to stop work.“Our agreement clearly states that payment has to be released within two months of execution of the work. Even a year after completing and submitting bills, we haven’t been paid. Our first invoice for Rs 56.60 lakh has not yet been honoured by BBMP. We have already expended over Rs 3 crore for the project and such undue delays in payment are a serious setback for us, especially being a social enterprise that works in the volatile sector of sanitation,” bemoaned chief executive officer of Eram Anwar Sadath K while speaking to Bangalore Mirror.“In the eventuality of non-payment of our dues, we impressed upon them our difficulty in continuing the project after March 31. BBMP conveyed in subsequent meetings that adequate measures would be taken to resolve the issues and release our payment at the earliest, but till date, not a single payment has been made. We are left with no option but to stop all work,” he said, going on to add, “In keeping with our transparent way of functioning and to keep the public aware, we will display a service withdrawal message on all eToilets from Saturday. It is a very unfortunate development, especially with the country celebrating the first anniversary of Swachh Bharat.” He said they had informed the BBMP that they would stop the service till they got their due payment but to no avail. “We will withdraw the service with immediate effect. With the BBMP going in for elections we do not see a way out,” he added.When contacted, BBMP’s executive engineer (projects) Vijaykumar Haridas did offer a glimmer of hope.“Their files have been cleared from our section and now the issue relates only to payment. The file is pending before the accounts section and I do not know the reason for the delay,” he said.Meanwhile, Eram has registered a complaint on the prime minister’s portal over the non-payment of work undertaken as part of the Swachh Bharat programme.