10 per cent of Metro-3 work finished, says MMRC

Mumbai: The Mumbai Metro Rail Corporation (MMRC) on Thursday announced that it has completed 10 per cent of the civil construction work for the Colaba-BKC-Seepz Metro-3 underground corridor. It has claimed that piling work has been completed on many locations and that the tunnel boring machines (TBM) will start arriving in the city from July onwards and the tunnelling work will begin from October.

“Based on the ongoing work progress we can safely say that 10 per cent of the civil works is completed and the tunnelling will begin by October,” said S.K. Gupta, director (projects), MMRC.

Currently, secant-piling work is ongoing and launching of the shaft has started at Azad Maidan, Cuffe Parade, Science Museum, Siddhivinayak Temple, Naya Nagar, Sahar Road, Pali Ground and Sariput Nagar.

The MMRC had started the civil construction work in October 2016 with an aim to complete 20 per cent of the civil works by December 2017.  

The entire 33.5 km-long corridor will be underground with a total civil construction cost of Rs 18,114.9 crore in seven packages. The overall cost of the project is around Rs 23,000 crore of which the Japanese International Cooperation Agency (JICA) is providing around Rs 13,000 crore as a project loan.

Currently, the MMRC is also studying on how the implementation of the Goods and Services Tax (GST) would affect the total cost of the project, as there would be relief in terms of taxation.  Mr Gupta, said, “We have the clause of taxation changing mentioned in out contract and if there is any decrease in the project cost of the Metro-3 line due to GST we will have pay less to the contractor.”

The Metro-3 corridor would be a crucial north-south link connecting major central business districts like that of Nariman Point, Bandra-Kurla Complex and Seepz in Andheri.