Urban News

Heavy rainfall once again waterlogged many areas of the city, including the road opposite the Deputy Commissioner’s residence. Water also flooded the DC’s house. The house needs to be renovated and the level needs to be raised, say MC officials. They were also caught on the wrong foot when the road drains on the road outside the DC residence were found to be choked.

As the water level inside the house increased, the MC men rushed to the spot and cleared the road drains, which were full of filth, including polythene, which clearly showed that they were not cleared since long.

The cleanliness drive outside the VIP area was over in about an hour’s time, but other parts of the city were not that lucky. The MC has spent crores on the construction of roads, but no effort has been made to make road drains, causing waterlogging and withering of roads.

Executive engineer Manjit Singh said, “I have written to the Building and Roadways department to make road drains on the Hambaran Road, road outside Khalsa College for Women, Club Road and many other areas where re-metalling is being done regularly, but no road drains have been made.”

It needs to be mentioned that Rs 4 crore was spent on the construction of Hambaran Road and a few thousands was the expenditure on installing road drains, which help in draining the rainwater from roads. 

Gill Road, Jamalpur Road, roads in Focal Point, Overloak Road and most of the roads in Dugri are also in the list, where road drains have not been installed. In the old city areas, the residents themselves have closed them and have encroached upon the roads. The areas where road drains exist are choked. Newsline team saw blocked road drains at Vishvkarma Chowk, near Gurdwara Dukhniwaran Sahib and Pakhowal Road in the recent past.

Interestingly, the Corporation clears the bills of the contractors and never bothers to check whether they have installed road drains or not and hence prepare fresh budget to re-metal roads in the next year. Councillors Parminder Mehta, Sarabjit Singh Kaka, Jagbir Singh Sokhi and many others have highlighted this issue in house a number of times.