PANJIM: As the people took to the social media to highlight the issue of potholes as death traps and negligence of the authorities, Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar intervened directing the Public Works Department (PWD) to work out an action plan to remove the potholes.
Parrikar held a meeting with PWD Minister Ramkrishna (Sudin) Dhavalikar and Principal Chief Engineer Uttam Parsekar, chief engineer, executive engineers of PWD to discuss the action plan for removal of potholes and other hindrances.
“During the course of the meeting, all executive engineers were instructed to make visits in their designated areas to check the state of roads for subsidence, potholes, breaks in wearing course, fallen trees etc and submit a weekly report to the Principal Chief Engineer,” a statement issued by the CMO stated.
“Directions were given to keep hot/cold mix of roads on standby and depending on the climatic condition to undertake repair work at the first dry spell,” CMO added.
Executive engineers have been instructed to use their powers to take remedial action and ensure quality. It was informed that at the monthly common committee meetings with the collector, cases related to digging of roads were to be discussed and streamlined with the necessary NOC. The Chief Minister also stressed on the need to improve inter-departmental coordination.
Speaking to the media, Dhavalikar said that concrete roads are the only solution to damaged roads. “We had a detailed meeting and I assure that all the potholes will be removed in next ten days,” he stated.
