In Kaimbwala village: UT AAP, BJP councillors spar over ‘bad road work material’

Efforts to reach Commissioner Anindita Mitra and Superintendent Engineer (road) Dharminder Shamra were unsuccessful as repeated calls to them went unanswered. (Source: Special Arrangement)

Mayor Anup Gupta, who is a BJP councillor, rejected AAP allegations stating, “In fact, yesterday night around 8 pm a few of our BJP workers in Kaimbwala called me informing about the shoddy job of the road contractor. I told them to stop the contractor. Today afternoon, MC teams collected the samples of the materials being used in the road construction.”

Damanpreet Singh said, “The road construction workers of the Municipal Corporation suddenly arrived in Kaimbwala village and began laying a layer of bitumen in the name of a concrete road. No one, including the area councillor Jaswinder Kaur, was informed about this construction work in her ward.”

Damanpreet added, “Alert villagers were surprised to see the work commence late at night. Upon inspection, they found out that the material was substandard. We have been trying to contact senior officers responsible for road engineering works in the Municipal Corporation but no one is responding.”

A local resident named Sherry, who alerted the community about the subpar road construction, told The Indian Express, “Before applying the bitumen to the gravel road, the construction workers turned off the streetlights in the area in an attempt to conceal their actions. Local youths informed me about this and we, along with others, arrived at the village late at night and halted the work. Around noon, the workers began removing the machinery from the village.” Councillor Jaswinder Kaur also expressed her dismay at the situation.

Municipal Corporation Commissioner Anindita Mitra said, “I have instructed the Superintendent Engineer (Building & Road) to collect the samples and get them tested from an approved laboratory. If the samples of the materials used for the road construction fail the test, the road contractor will be penalised. I also instructed a team to submit a report on whether the laid procedures for constructing a road are being followed by the contractor or not in this matter. The procedures include the depth of the layer of pebbles, sand, and the use of a road-roller over it prior to laying the layer of bitumen. The construction of a road at village Kaimbwala is a pending project.”