Srinagar, Nov 22: Just opposite the famed Nigeen Club is Dar Mohalla, an old residential colony on the City outskirts. But decades on, the lane leading to this Mohalla is so dilapidated that people often slip and get injured.
 With time, though locals have learnt to manage walk on the “stone age” streets, they often caution visitors saying: be aware of fall.
 The residents said successive regimes never paid any concern towards the lane even though apart from scores on residential houses, it houses a high school.
 Just yesterday, the locals said a schoolboy lost balance on the uneven road while rushing towards the Greenland School.
 “His face got so wounded that he had to be rushed to hospital for treatment,” said a local while pointing towards the bumpy lane with boulders protruding out.
 Interestingly, sometime back when the Lakes and Waterways Development Authority (LAWDA) constructed a drain there, there was a hope that the lane would be repaired.
 But even though the drain work has been completed, road repairs didn’t come up.
 “Leave apart repairs, they didn’t even level the road,” the locals complained adding that they informed the local MLA Dr Mustafa Kamal but to no avail.
 The macadamization of this road in plush Nigeen, often frequented by foreign tourists, has remained a dream, which never realized for many of the locals till they breathed their last.
 Same holds true for an elderly inhabitant who breathed his last, past week.
 “All his life, he hoped that the road would be repaired. But his hope remained a hope,” said members of the bereaved family while mourners kept pouring in.
 On the Rasm-e-Chaharum, many of the visitors could be seen walking cautiously as locals had a advice: please walk cautiously lest you may fall.

Lastupdate on : Mon, 22 Nov 2010 21:30:00 Makkah time
Lastupdate on : Mon, 22 Nov 2010 18:30:00 GMT
Lastupdate on : Tue, 23 Nov 2010 00:00:00 IST