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Bad roads here to stay
Looks like denizens have to put up with the bad-road conditions forever for there is no fool-proof quality control measure to make the newly-laid roads sustain.
​Hyderabad: Looks like denizens have to put up with the bad-road conditions forever for there is no fool-proof quality control measure to make the newly-laid roads sustain.
There are just two quality control engineers to ensure the quality of 9,029-km long roads under the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation limits. Severe staff crunch was affecting the efforts to improve road maintenance in the city limits, revealed a source to The Hans India. T
hough experts from JNTU-H and IIT were roped in to check the quality of the roads it is not sufficient to ensure world-class quality roads about which the government has been talking about.
The corporation requires at least 20 quality check engineers to improve the road infrastructure. Major reforms should take place in engineering wing for better performance. Besides, laying of roads was not being done in a scientific manner, the source said.
The GHMC has not been following the standard procedures. Lack of committed officers at the ground level and pressures from ruling party politicians also causes problems in adhering to the set standards of laying of roads, said the source.
There have also been cases where a few officials were found to be hand in glove with the private contractors. They hand over the road laying projects to certain blacklisted firms. The firms which are blacklisted float another new company and bag the contracts. Unless the engineering wing undergoes a major overhauling things may not improve, the source said.
A senior GHMC official said that even the procedure to call for the tenders and finalise them was not carried out properly. Short-tender process has resulted in bad quality of works and has invited criticism from all quarters of the civil society. There have also been instances where the contractors have been producing bills for repairs of same roads once in six months, he said.
The GHMC official opined that the corporation should strictly follow the World Bank norms so that there should be at least six weeks time to finalise the tender for major works and four weeks for minor repairs.
He said that the corporation should conduct a background check of the contractor before handing over the project to him. He said that such procedures would help the civic body to enhance the quality of works.
