The roads and pavements across Salt Lake are being cleared of dumped tree branches and dud cables that had been lying around for the past several days risking the lives of commuters and residents alike.
A clean-up drive was launched on Thursday by the Bidhannagar Municipal Corporation, which provides civic services to all three sectors of the township.
Teams equipped with shovels, picks and small payloaders are moving around in Salt Lake to clear the roads of branches that had been sticking around like pikes as well as snipped cables.
Multiple teams have been dispatched throughout all three sectors of Salt Lake.
The Telegraph had reported on Sunday that nearly all the main thoroughfares of Salt Lake had turned extremely risky for both motorists as well as pedestrians with branches and cables strewn everywhere as a result of a tree-trimming drive that had been conducted.
A senior official of the Bidhannagar Municipal Corporation said it would take them several more days to clear the roads as the number of operational dump trucks had nearly halved because of mechanical troubles and other issues.
“We are also facing a shortage in the number of temporary labourers as many are down with fever. Apart from this, many of our trucks are facing mechanical issues,” said the official of the solid waste management department that is in charge of garbage disposal as well as clearing the roads and arteries of Salt Lake.
On Thursday, this newspaper saw that the branches had been cleared up in several places, including a stretch of Seventh Cross Road that connects the new bridge linking Salt Lake with VIP Road near Kestopur to the Karunamoyee intersection, one of the busiest crossings in Salt Lake.
Branches and cables have also been cleared in some places of the Eastern Drainage Canal side road that connects several blocks of the township with EM Bypass near the Chingrighata crossing.
However, the teams need to pick up the pace and clear up dud and snipped cables that dot every road and major thoroughfare of the township.
Such cables have caused fatal accidents in the city and are extremely dangerous. Salt Lake has several places, including Broadway — the main artery that connects EM Bypass with the township — full of dud and coils of cables lying on the road.
This newspaper also spotted several low-hanging cables on Thursday.
The stretch of road near the Kalyan Jewellers island adjacent to City Centre had low-hanging wires. Similarly, a portion of Second Avenue, in front of the CGO Complex, had coils of cables, low-hanging wires as well as multiple deep potholes and craters.
While the teams are clearing the roads of branches and wires there is no clarity from the civic authorities when repairs of the potholed stretches will begin finally.