Let one agency maintain roads

Residentspeak: let one agency maintain roads
Times of India

• The 100 feet district main road connecting Old Madras Road and Varthur via C.V. Ramanagar and Kaggadasapura has shrunk to 18 feet. Thanks to encroachments.

•The Bannerghatta Road is a state highway supposed to be maintained by Public Works Department (PWD). Under Bommanahalli CMC, it has become an orphaned stretch.

•Sarjapur Road comes under PWD’s maintenance, but the area falls under a gram panchayat. The government had to set up a task force to make the road look like one.

Who’s responsible for all these? Not us, says every department. None realise in the process of passing the buck, they are killing a city’s reputation. The statistics speak for itself — of the 15,600 km of road network in the city and its peripheral areas, only 16% were asphalted in 1998. In 2004, though it increased to 24% as per the data collected from satellite images, isn’t it still a pity?

For Bangalore spread over 1,500 sq km, including BCC, BDA, CMCs and BMRDA areas, there is no centralised agency to maintain roads. For every work, there is a demarcation. For instance, the Kanakapura Road is asphalted till Metro junction. There is no road after that because the rest of the stretch belongs not to BCC but to CMC!

“The government must initiate a debate on whether crucial departments like roads be integrated under a single agency. This can act as an umbrella agency empowered to take up road works just anywhere in Bangalore. This seems to be the only solution to put an end to this buck passing practice,’’ say representatives of several resident associations.

The government wakes up only when problems aggravate. When IT czar Azim Premji voiced the lack of infrastructure on Sarjapur Road last year, the government didn’t know where to look for all the answers — no one was clear about under whose jurisdiction the Wipro office was located. But the issue was a complicated one. The Wipro office on Sarjapur Road was not within the designated IT belt. It falls under Doddakannahalli gram panchayat limits, but Sarjapur Road was maintained by PWD. The government found a solution to the issue by setting up a task force to repair the road.

“Because of the demarcation, we’ll be forced to limit works to our section. I know asphalting a one or two km stretch after the BCC border will not cost us big, but the council will tear me into pieces. I’ll be crucified for carrying out works outside BCC jurisdiction,’’ says a BCC official. “Why can’t the authorities think of an agency that could take care of the entire road works in Greater Bangalore area?,’’ ask BCC officials. The residents could be roped in to monitor road works. On an average, every lane has an engineer and the authorities could prepare a chart on the specifications and distribute it among residents/associations.