Politicians are the same all over. They promise to build bridges even when there are no rivers.

This quote almost came to life yesterday when Tassaduq Hussain Mufti, in a written reply said

“The Irrigation and Flood Control (I&FC) Department has undertaken construction of design and construction of auto-mechanically operated barrage across the Tawi under which creation of artificial lake was one of the components of the project. Further, work on the construction of design and construction of barrage is targeted to be completed by March-end and the work is in progress,”

While the river is still there, what seems to be taking an eternity to come up is the Artificial Lake at river Tawi.

In a news report by the Tribune, the J&K state government has been caught on the wrong foot after it claimed in the legislature that work on the artificial lake in Jammu was in progress and it was targeted to be completed by March-end this year.

Almost anybody from Jammu could tell that neither there is any construction taking place at the site nor there is any machinery related to the project.

The work on the project has been abandoned for more than 2.5 years. It has jumped several deadlines and the chances of its completion within the fresh deadline look bleak.

The blatant whitewash-of-a-lie, by the Tourism Minister came in a written reply to a query of BJP legislator Ramesh Arora in the Legislative Council on Wednesday.

GVR Infra Project Limited, the agency executing the project is not amused and are refusing to go on with the abandoned project on repeated pleas of the I&FC Department.

Sources say, “Although some progress was recently made in this regard after the I&FC Department signed a fresh agreement with the agency, there are remote chances that work will be completed within the fresh deadline”.

Irrigation Minister Sham Lal Choudhary had earlier set January 2018 as the deadline for the project.