The Himachal Pradesh Government considering roads as harbinger of prosperity and development and claiming giving top priority to its constriction maintenance and up-gradation.
The State Public Works Department claiming putting all possible effort to strengthen the road network in the State. However, plight of many roads in the state portrait different story as so far department has even failed to repair its existing one.
As per the department, Himachal has a road density of 60.16 km per 100 square kilometre area and total road length in the State is 33491 kilometers, which connecting 3027 Panchayats out of a total of 3243 Panchayats of the State with motorable roads.
The State Public Works Department also claiming for making sincere efforts to improve Black Spots on all roads for which it has initiated a Road Accident Data Management System (RADMS), but despite it, accidents were making headlines regularly in the media.
To ensure quality management of the works of the department, the State Government had set-up Quality Control Wing in Public Works Department as a separate independent unit in the year 2003, but poor patch works were widely visible on most of the roads.
The state government has set-up a Central Material Testing Laboratory at Shimla and two zonal level Material Testing Laboratories at Mandi and Dharamshala along with laboratories at Nurpur, Solan, Bilaspur, Rampur and Hamirpur circles, which are being upgraded at the cost of Rs. 75 lakhs.
With all these development boosting, the State Public Works Department, in its feature issued from Public Relation Department, has failed to portray the plight of lakhs of people of the state, who were suffering from dilapidated condition of road.
The condition of Theog – Hatkoti – Rohru road is known to all, where locals were suffering from past six years. Despite PWD boosting, the roads in the apple growing region have become headache for apple growers and daily commuters and it is also hurting them financially.
It’s not Theog – Hatkoti – Rohru alone, but roads of Chopal, Kinnaur, Ani, Shilai, Renukaji, Baddi-Nalagarh, many parts of Kangra district and Chamba etc. were in the same league and crying for the immediate attention of the department.
I hope the State Public Works Department is listening.
