Bhubaneswar, May 17: The state government may not be able to meet the target of completing an integrated sewerage treatment system for the city by 2014.

The problems of land acquisition, relocating electric poles and removing encroachment for the purpose appear to be constant impediments.

Officials of the Orissa Water Supply and Sewerage Board (OWSSB) feel that the city management group (CMG), including leading agencies for city development, should make land available for the project on time.

Earlier, the sewerage system was planned to be over by 2012, but later at a high-level meeting, it was decided to postpone the deadline to 2014.

The project has a target to lay 797km underground network, 34 pumping stations to manage sewage flow and six treatment plants at various localities to treat polluted water. For this, the board needs 172.93 acres, but till date only 35.27 acres are available.

“We have deposited Rs 96 crore with them,” said a senior engineer of the board.

The board officials said they were doing their best. “In many parts of the city, drain water is getting mixed up with sewer water. This is also contaminating ground water,” said a senior project engineer B.K. Parida of the board, adding that these matters need urgent attention.

Explaining the delays, the senior board official said: “To lay big pipelines, we need road cutting permission from other departments. However, there are procedural delays. While we have to cut 287.77km road from the BMC, the PWD has to give permission for 68.30km, National Highway 6.70km, water resources department 12km, the Bhubaneswar Development Authority 12.23km, the rural works department 7km, the panchayati raj department 10km, East Coast Railways 5.2km and the central public works department 2.20km. Many agencies, however, have recently given a go ahead.”

While the transportation of goods for construction is not possible due to non-permission by the traffic authorities during daytime, the shifting of electric poles has been delayed in many parts of the city.

“The information given by the telecom authorities after a series of meeting will show something, but when the sewerage workers will start their work, it is seen that the cables are laid with a different plan. Therefore, we have to be extra cautious and the work becomes very slow,” said a junior engineer.

Another major problem comes as encroachment. “For example, the Phase-I houses in Palaspalli area numbering 146 are typically designed to have their conservancy area towards the backyard of a row of houses. As the houses have no gap in between, the sewerage line has to pass through the conservancy area of about 40ft, but most of the parts are encroached. Only in the Phase-II with 43 houses, we could complete the sewerage line as the second phase is built with a different layout. We have asked the CMG and in their meeting on May 7, they decided to carry out a demolition drive so that we could start our project there,” said a senior engineer.

“Out of the 34 pumping stations and six treatment plants, land for one each is available with the board. Therefore, unless the land for the other ones are provided we cannot proceed further,” said an official.