The concerned authorities should stop ignoring or taking lightly the demands of people in several areas of Srinagar city for macadamisation or repairing of roads.
A number of roads in the city are dilapidated in absence of macadamisation or repair. If this is condition of roads, and the attitude of government officials in the capital city, what can be the situation in towns and villages.
The poor performance here projects a very sorry state of affairs. Reports of concerned officials ignoring the demands of local residents for macadamisation of roads or repairs continue to pour in.
Residents of Dairwani-Batamaloo area have such a complaint. So, have the people about a road at Sonwar from Banamsar to Palpora-Sonwar. Residents of Harwan, Hazratbal, and New Theed allege similar problems.
The list of such complaints is long with no-one coming to the rescue of the affected people. There should be an end to such official callousness. The people in several areas of Srinagar must not suffer.
The government officials say that the average road macadamisation in J&K has been increased to 20.6 km per day in last three years as compared to 6.54 km per day before 2019.
They also state that the road length in J&K has increased to 41,141 kilometres and the percentage of blacktop roads has reached to 74 percent as compared to 66 percent in 2019.
Amid these official figures, the residents in affected areas in the city say they are moving from pillar to post to get their problems solved and that nobody is listening to them.
When they go to Roads and Buildings Department (R&B) officials, they are told that macadamisation of such roads has to be done by Srinagar Municipal Corporation (SMC) as all the link roads and most of roads in Srinagar city are under its jurisdiction now. They say that R&B is taking care of major roads only.
The residents say that when they approach SMC, nothing is done. Because of the non-resolution of the problem, the dilapidated roads continue to create problems to commuters and pedestrians. Potholes make driving problematic.
Sometimes accidents also occur. During rains, the water logging and traffic jamming occurs on these roads. It is a big problem. The concerned authorities must listen to the people and repair and macadamise the roads without any further delay.
Any complacency on part of the government officials must be taken seriously.