Port Blair, May 04: Hundreds of residents of Old Pahargaon continue to face inconvenience as authorities have failed to restore the arterial road near Sapna Theatre closed for the past two months following a series of landslides caused due to careless excavation of earth inside the airport campus.
Following the closure of the road, diversion of traffic through narrow road stretches has amplified the risk of accidents and motorists are having a harrowing time particularly during rush hours.
In the month of January last year, a massive chunk of road in New Pahargaon caved in due to the earth extraction work leaving huge cracks on the road surface. While the airport authority did nothing to prevent the landslide and continued excavation of earth, another big landslide hit the same region about two months later.
The Lt. Governor taking note of the issue asked the Secretary of Civil Aviation to take remedial measures. After inspection of the site, the then Secretary of Civil Aviation ordered temporary closure of the road and instructed the APWD to take necessary repair works.
Even the then Secretary of Civil Aviation had visited the spot personally and directed the Airport Authority of India to stop the careless earth cutting works but nothing really happened.
The APWD executed for the repair works and reopened the road for normal traffic after about 7 seven days. However, the Airport Authority allegedly continued to the earth excavation work to fill up the marshy area near INS Utkrosh Office due to which the landslide further wreaked havoc in the region with more landslides.
The APWD closed for road for repair works about 60 days ago. However, diversion of traffic through narrow road stretches in New Pahargaon has become fresh trouble for the residents. “In what depicts lack of scientific expertise in the concerned agencies, a period of two months is not enough for road repair works. Vehicles passing through narrow stretches in New Pahargaon leads to traffic pile-up during busy hours.
The thin stretches are not suitable for two-way traffic and have increased the risk of road accidents during rush hours. Some parts of the road are so tattered that vehicle owners have suffered damage to vehicles. Absence of traffic police has aggravated the situation further.
Moreover, motorists are forced to take detours of about 500 mtrs to one kilometres to reach their homes due to the closure of the road. The APWD should speed up the road repair works and open the road at the earliest so that lives return to normalcy at New Pahargaon,” said some harried residents.
Every road stretch is government property and in this case a good stretch of road has been damaged. Many question that why in this case no FIR was launched? Is law different for general public and rich contractors?
