Contractor accuses L&T of fraud in tsunami project

Mumbai: A Larsen & Toubro (L&T) Group entity, L&T Construction, Chennai, which is building the Ram Temple in Ayodhya, has been accused of perpetrating an alleged fraud by its consortium contractor, while implementing India's World Bank-aided tsunami alert projects in two eastern States.

The WB-funded project -- first in India as part of a global initiative for safety in coastal regions -- was intended to sound an advance warning to the disaster management authorities and people living on shoresides of any impending tsunami threats following earthquakes.

The backdrop was the massive devastation caused in many countries, including South India, by the deadly tsunami triggered after the Japan earthquake on March 11, 2011. The multi-crore rupees prestigious pilot project -- Alert Siren Systems, part of a comprehensive Early Warning & Dissemination System (EWDS) -- came up in Odisha and Andhra Pradesh, around 2018, touching the Bay of Bengal.

In February 2016, the Central PSU, Telecommunications Consultants India Ltd (TCIL), appointed L&T Construction as the main contractor, along with Telegrafia of Slovakia and its sole distributor for the sophisticated EWDS, Spectral India, New Delhi, to execute the project within nine months.

Spectral India named a representative, Pankaj Agrawal, to handle the routine work on its behalf with both Telegrafia and L&T Construction, and initially everything apparently worked smoothly.

"Somewhere, without our knowledge, Telegrafia quietly bypassed us to deal directly with Agrawal through his entity, Stalworth Systems, Mumbai. Later, Stalworth Systems claimed it is the India partner of Telegrafia," Spectral India Chairman BC Yesudas said.