As Project Manager constructing a Navigational Lock at Farakka, West Bengal, Rajaneesh Kumar Rai had two major issues at hand: the remoteness of his site that is about 300 km from Kolkata and the disorganized nature of his labour force. “We do not have full strength labour camps at site as most of the workmen are from the nearby local villages,” he explains, “and they are all part of two committees (trade union type) with their own rules and systems. Therefore, remobilization of the workforce and trying to convince them to wear masks and maintain social distance was tough but the real challenge was to remove the fear from their minds.”

Rajanessh, however, is no stranger to challenges having earlier worked on the London Underground for 5 years. “I was with Balfour Beatty Civil Engineering Limited as a Package Manager,” he shares. “With L&T GeoStructure, I was previously Project Manager at the NTPC Nabinagar Bihar for the ‘CW System and Makeup Water System Civil Works’ for 4 years till 2019.”

As measures to combat COVID-​19, “we took serious steps to educate the subcontractors and the manpower suppliers in advance to maintain discipline in their daily meetings, practice social distancing and take other precautionary measures at the workplace. We have severe issues of logistics at the best of times but during the lockdown, sourcing food, medicines and other consumables became extremely difficult.”

The IR Team, meanwhile, established a good PR with all the local administrative authorities taking them into confidence like the local police departments, BDO, the local MLA and political parties who supported the team during the crisis. It is often said that good practices take root during times of crisis and as Rajaneesh shares, “Each department head has taken the initiative to interact daily with their team before start of work and it has become a practice now. We also maintained excellent relationships with the client that has also stood us in good stead,” he smiles.

All their good work bore fruit for Rajaneesh and his team as “mobilization of resources was possible from 20th April itself,” he says with immense satisfaction, “as we were having regular update meetings with the subcontractors, manpower suppliers and equipment suppliers. Concrete was poured in the same week,” he pronounces victoriously.

The focus for a seasoned campaigner like Project Manager, R Ravikumar, during the days of the COVID-​19 lockdown was to keep his site – the Sea Water Intake Project for a Super Critical Thermal Power Project in Uppur, Ramanathapuram District, Tamil Nadu — primed and ready for a swift and early resumption of operations. “In fact, initially I felt that it would be better for me to be with my family during this crisis but then I thought about the 300 migrants and about 100 local workmen under my supervision at site and decided to stay put at the site.” He pauses and adds, “Staying back at site actually helped us because I was able to continuously follow up with my clients for an early start, received permission to restart on 26th April and started all activities on 27th,” he shares with a sense of achievement.

At the Uppur site, Ravikumar concentrated on keeping his site active for an easy restart. “With my team, I was managing the migrant workmen at the camp that is situated inside our site and I also had to manage the local authorities like the Collector, the Tahsildhar, Police Officials, Labour Commissioners, Health Inspectors, etc.” The team ensured essential commodities for the workmen including free rations, that the camp remained neat and clean with proper sanitization and fumigation and pepped up the workmen with frequent toolbox chats. The situation called for teamwork and Ravikumar acknowledges the stellar role of his team members at site. “They stood with me in all aspects to control the migrants daily, ensure that facilities were provided and controlled the site to avoid any unsafe acts.”

He is a veteran having been a part of over a hundred projects during his three decade-​plus tenure with L&T. “I have been involved with project sites in different parts of the country and a few overseas doing geotechnical investigations, drilling & grouting, ground improvements, all kind of foundation works and much more,” shares C Sidharthan, mentioning several of these projects prominent among them being the atomic power plants at Kaiga, Kalpakkam, Kundankulam, international airports of Mumbai, Hyderabad, Delhi and Bangalore, MFFK jetty extension at Kattupalli and Kalinga International Coal Terminal, Paradip. Presently, he is heading the Cut & Cover Section Project of Phase I extension for Chennai Metro Rail Limited at Tondiarpet, Chennai and with Chennai a ‘hot zone’ Sidharthan and his team had their work cut out.

“Our first and foremost challenge was to maintain the decorum, health and safety of the workman force spread across four camps with physical and financial progress of work having stopped due to the global lockdown,” says Sidharthan. “Maintaining their wellbeing and convincing them not to panic and remain at their accommodation at all times were big tasks too.” The team ensured that all PPEs were provided and all precautionary measures taken to keep the workmen healthy with periodic health check-​ups, stringent washing protocols, use of masks, practicing social distancing and maintaining hygiene. “We arranged for isolation rooms and the Arogya Setu app was installed by our staff and workmen to complete the self-assessments.”

HQ supported the efforts of Sidharthan and his team in every way possible with motivation, monetary help, arranging for visits and surveillance for the team members as and when required. “Our team of essential services for dewatering & plumbing, electrical & site lighting, watch & guard personnel have stuck to their task throughout and deserve a round of applause,” he remarks.

Sidharthan hails from Salem in Tamil Nadu. His wife is S Tamil Selvi, who he says is engaged in “taking care of my family!” They are blessed with two children, daughter, S Brindha and son, S Gnanajothy. “Oh yes,” he nods, “initially they were worried because of my age and diabetic health condition but now have at least partially accepted that we have to live in this situation for some months more.” He loves to read during his free time and some of his most memorable moments are, “When we did India’s first CFA (Continues Flight Auger) Pile at L&T Rajpura Power Project in 2010 and India’s first Spun Pile at Cinda Project, Baruch in 2012.”

“I am always proud of every aspect of L&T Construction and for being a part of it,” he avers in conclusion.

Tulasi Das Govvada is leading the project team at the Paradip Port Trust handling the civil works to construct a 30 MMTPA capacity coal handling export terminal for JSW. “Our structure is at a very critical stage of construction and stopping work would have adversely affected the overall safety of the structure so although the whole country stopped due to the lockdown, we could not afford to stop,” he says. “We continued with the construction works albeit with minimum resources during the lockdown in strict adherence to all the COVID-​19 directives and other safety measures.” He and his team kept the fire stoked, as it were, and once the relaxations were announced, his was one of the first projects to resume operations.

Elaborating on his present assignment, he flags off the critical Track hopper construction with the coffer dam structure at 18 m below ground level under testing conditions, adjacent to a road on one side with the backwaters only some 5 m away and an operational railway line on the other. “Constructing in such a scenario calls for utmost safety and high skill technical efficiency,” he shares seriously. “The coffer dam structure is constructed with continuous sheet piling and huge struts (1050 MT) system of 45 m spans installed end to end.” He also mentions the 60 continuous dewatering wells that have been installed around the structure to lower the water table to facilitate construction.

“We only operated essential and critical works deploying the necessary manpower on a rotation basis to monitor the construction,” informs Tulasi Das. “All the employees and workmen adopted hygienic conditions by self-​cleaning their own living spaces at their camps and company guest houses apart from completely disinfecting the entire premises.”