manoj

ROADS

The improvement of roads began in real earnest only after the media raised a stink on their state. A public interest litigatation filed in Bombay High Court also forced the BMC to stay on its toes when it came to maintenance of roads. The

administration set up the N V Merani Committee to recommend ways to lay better roads a couple of years back. The suggestions are out but no one can say they have been followed faithfully.

THE ROAD AHEAD

The BMC has taken up 58 km of roads for concretisation at a cost of Rs 327 crore and 178 kms of asphalt-covered roads for

improvement at a cost of Rs 239 crore. The BMC administration claims that the roads are being improved in accordance with the M V Merani Committee’s recommendations. Problem is that D N Road, already redone according to those suggestions (or so the BMC claimed), threw up potholes last monsoon. An independent audit of roads show a lack of supervision is seriously compromising the quality of work and the ruling combine may find it difficult to ensure that roads last longer than their five-year tenure despite the continual digging by the 16 utility agencies.


Additional municipal commissioner Srikant Singh said some time back there were at least 10 new roads needing digging to attend to water leakages. The BMC recently recruited around 4,500 engineers. But this will not solve the problem. The Merani Committee recommended a blue-book with regular training workshops.

Source:http://epaper.timesofindia.com (Mumbai Edition)
Date of Publish: 06 feb 2007

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