When it comes to take the blame for continuous road digging where does the buck stops? No, it doesn’t stop anywhere. It simply goes from one to another. Not one, but there are half-a-dozen agencies who should the blame for the sorry state of the roads at present.
Improper planning and lack of coordination have lead to a situation where different departments dug up roads every other day to lay a maze of underground sewerage lines, water supply pipelines and utility cables criss-crossing one another.
Potholes left behind by recent rains and the patches re-laid by utility companies are leaving roads dangerous for motorists.
Road digging has become a common feature in the city and this happens without any warning, complained B. Katyayini of Masab Tank. “With most of the road carriageway taken over for repair activities, where is the space for commuters?” she asked.
Even in key areas such as Raj Bhavan Road, Panjagutta, Rasoolpura and Begumpet, among other busy stretches, the pits that were dug up by the utility companies were left without proper barricades. With sudden showers lashing the city, these pits could prove fatal, she pointed out. The ongoing soil testing by the Hyderabad Metro too has been compounding the problems for motorists. “While Metro could be a boon for the city, authorities should also address the motorists’ problems,” M. Seshagiri Rao of Tarnaka said.The edges of the roads are either riddled with potholes or dug-up. With Metro Rail project occupying the central portion of the roads at several stretches, motorists are forced to go through these bad patches, he said.Authorities, on the other hand, pointed out that they were allowing repair works only if they are unavoidable. “We approve only 20 per cent of the requests that we receive. We also put a deadline for the contractor to complete their work failing which legal action will be taken against him,” Additional Commissioner of Police (Traffic) C.V. Anand explained.Some repair works are also being taken up for the United Nation’s Conference of Parties on Biodiversity (COP-11) in October. “Works are being taken up at some stretches identified for the event. Though there is a bit of a delay, we are trying to ensure that the works will be completed at the earliest,” GHMC Engineer-in-Chief Dhan Singh added.Metro officials on the other hand shift the responsibility of maintaining the available carriage way to the civic bodies, though it has taken over almost half of the available carriage way for construction of pillars. The assurance was that Metro authorities will take up responsibility for maintaining the carriageway.
