Shillong, Dec 18: Minister in-charge Public Health Engineering (PHE) Renikton Lyngdoh Tongkhar on Friday informed that his department is aware of the ‘inferior quality’ of GI pipes supplied to the State for the implementation of the Jal Jeevan Mission (JJM). Warning the concerned company of engaging in such dubious activity, the Minister said if another such instance is detected, the government will blacklist the company.

“If repeated again, it will be the responsibility of the state government to take action against the company, either to stop the payment or even to blacklist the company,” Tongkhar told journalists.

His statement comes in response to the Khasi Students’ Union (KSU) demanding setting up of a magisterial inquiry into the supply of low quality GI pipes for the implementation of the Jal Jeevan Mission (JJM).

Tongkhar, however, informed that the department had already directed the Jindal India Ltd, a Kolkata based company to replace the inferior quality GI pipes, before the KSU detected the incident.

“The KSU found (the anomaly) on December 15, but the department had already detected before this and had issued a letter to the concerned company on December 6, for immediate replacement of the inferior quality pipes,” he said.

Tongkhar informed that the company had claimed that due to bulk supply, mistakes might have been made while loading the pipes. “However, we are on the job to take action and ensure this is not repeated in the future,” he said.

When asked if an inquiry would be set up, the Minister however said that the department will examine the matter.

The minister also informed that the third party was supposed to check and certify the pipes supplied to the state government.

“So here again there is a question to the third party who has checked and inspected the pipes because from the state government we expected to get good quality pipes as checked and certified by the third party,” he said.