Patna, Feb. 14: The Patna Municipal Corporation (PMC), which outsourced the garbage collection work of 10 wards to A2Z Infrastructure two years ago, is yet to release the payment to the private agency.

Sources in the PMC said the corporation owes Rs 5 crore to A2Z Infrastructure, the payment for its work done in the past 13 months.

A2Z had entered into an agreement with the civic body in 2008 and started work in select parts of the city from January last year.

A senior PMC official said: “At present, the company is carrying out garbage collection work on nine major city streets. It has also entered into an in-principle agreement with us to carry out sanitation work in all 72 wards of the city. However, as Rs 5 crore is due from the corporation, work at the other wards has not yet started. A detailed agreement regarding the expansion of the project has also not been signed.”

According to the agreement, A2Z currently looks after the cleaning work in Frazer Road, Bailey Road, Boring Canal Road, Exhibition Road, Beerchand Patel Road, Ashok Rajpath, Old Bypass Road and Hardinge Road. It has further proposed a door-to-door garbage collection system under which workers employed by the company will go to every household in all 72 wards of the city and collect garbage every morning.

Mayor Afzal Imam said the corporation board had cleared the payment to the agency at its meeting two months ago. “I will see to it that the payment is made as soon as possible. A new municipal commissioner has taken charge and it might take a couple of weeks for the release of the payment. But we will not let the delay hamper the sanitation work in the city,” he said.

Vikas Jha, the deputy general manager of A2Z, said the agency has not been paid a single penny since it took up the project. “We would have been in a position to start the sanitation work across the city by now if we were paid our dues. Unprecedented delay on the part of the civic body has delayed the entire process,” said Jha.

Jha said the company has nine large trucks and 120 mini trucks in the capital to transport the garbage collected by around 450 workers. “We have adequate infrastructure and logistic support for the current workload but we need about 1,500 workers and increased infrastructure to take up the proposed work. Non-payment of dues by the civic body is causing the delay,” he said.