Salt Lake: Road repairs across Salt Lake and its adjoining areas will be overseen by engineers sent by the Kolkata Metropolitan Development Authority (KMDA) to the Bidhannagar Municipal Corporation (BMC).
The decision to send KMDA engineers to the BMC was taken on Thursday at a review meeting chaired by urban development and municipal affairs minister Firhad Hakim and attended by Bidhannagar MLA Sujit Bose, BMC mayor Krishna Chakraborty and the other 40 councillors of the civic body.
The BMC provides civic services to Salt Lake and places along VIP Road, including Kestopur, Baguiati, Teghoria and parts of Rajarhat.
A BMC councillor said after the review meeting, held in Salt Lake’s Nagarayan building, that Hakim expressed his displeasure at the bad road conditions in Salt Lake and its adjoining areas.
This newspaper has reported several times about Salt Lake’s crumbling road network.
Most roads are pockmarked with craters of varying shapes and sizes and a dust of cloud perpetually hangs over the broken stretches.
Another councillor said Hakim asked how the state of roads turned so bad despite the state government sending adequate funds for repairs regularly.
“The minister said the condition of the roads in Salt Lake and its neighbouring areas are in a deplorable state,” the councillor said.
After coming out of the meeting, Hakim told The Telegraph that several engineers from the KMDA would be sent to the Bidhannagar civic body “on deputation” to oversee the road repairs.
“The engineers will oversee all road repairs in Salt Lake and other areas under the BMC. Thorough repairs will be done, including the removal of the broken layers and laying of fresh layers of asphalt, instead of patchwork repairs that were undertaken over the past several years,” Hakim said.
“Engineers experienced in road repairs will be sent to the BMC.”
Referring to mounds of garbage routinely seen along roads in Salt Lake, Hakim said more trucks, to be taken on lease, will be deployed to transport waste from the township to Dhapa.
A councillor said several trucks earmarked for conservancy operations are hit by snags.
Salt Lake, spread across 33.5sq km, generates around 150 tonnes of garbage every day.
