Road repair only before visarjan

With more than 48 hours of incessant rains,the extensive road repair exercise undertaken by the BMC in the past two weeks has literally been washed away.

BMC officials admitted that the number of potholes have risen drastically again and the civic body will now be able to carry out complete repair work only before Ganesha visarjan on September 11 instead of the earlier promised deadline of before the beginning of the 10-day festival on September 1.

Data issued by the roads department of the BMC on Thursday said there were about 60 locations across the city that are pockmarked with potholes. However,the downpour has caused the number to rise considerably.

Chief engineer roads Satish Badve said because of the weekend,BMC staff has not been able to carry out fresh assessment of the number of pothole locations. Once it stops raining,we will survey the extent of the damage. If it continues raining so heavily for another few days,we will be able to effectively fill potholes only before visarjan on September 11 and not earlier, he said.

Naresh Dahibawkar,president of the Brihanmumbai Sarvajanik Ganeshotsav Samanvay Samiti,said: On August 1,our estimate of total number of pothole locations was about 2,000. It came down drastically in the next two weeks,but now again it has increased to close to 1,500 locations. Why is the repair work always temporary? Mandals will now face difficulty while transporting idols on such bad roads to the pandal locations, he said.

The use of hot asphalt mix is impossible during rains. At such times,we use bigger aggregates and dump them into the pothole without any adhesive mix. It is just a temporary solution. We do not have any other option right now,considering how much it is raining, added Badve.

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