Needed: A pothole action committee!

Considering the number of deaths that have happened on city roads in the past few months, it’s time to seriously consider setting up a ‘Pothole Action Committee’ which will make sure every pothole is inevitably filled within 24 hours after it starts making life hell for motorists and pedestrians alike!

The latest victim of the pothole menace is a 24-year-old student from Kerala, who was unlucky enough to be hit by a car which swerved while trying to avoid a pothole. The incident left the car driver and pillion rider on the bike seriously injured.

People keep dying on roads due to accidents -it could be rash or drunken driving, it could be overspeeding or sheer inexperience. But when youngsters die for no fault of theirs and become victims of civic and state apathy, it is something which should make every concerned citizen sit up and take note.

A couple of weeks ago, one could blame it on the heavy rains which lashed the city, making it virtually impossible for the authorities to take up a pothole-filling exercise. But now, the rains seem to have ceased and it’s just the time to take up repairs on an urgent footing.

But that hardly seems to be happening with city residents condemned to back-breaking journeys on the roads trying their best to skirt the gaping craters so that neither their vehicle nor their backbone take a jarring hit. Rudimentary efforts to fill potholes will not suffice for most of the gravel and little stones which civic workers dump on potholes and then hastily seal it up with bitumen, come off in a few weeks. Has the government run out of funds to keep the roads in the IT Capital of the country in good shape? Or is it civic apathy and the ‘chalta hai’ attitude which is making our ministers and officers turn a blind eye to potholes and focus on other issues?

Not that a massive pothole filling exercise will serve to undo all the damage that the rains have wrought on city roads. There are several main roads where pothole filling has made the ride all the more bumpier for motorists with ugly corners jutting out. There are also roads, if one could call them that, where no amount of repairs will help to set them right-these are stretches which will have to be recast in their entirety so that the potholes are kept at bay at least for a year or two.

There is also a need to pay attention to the many civic projects which remain incomplete in the city and are adding to the woes of citizens. Whether it be Namma metro carriageways or flyovers and underpasses, they all add to the pothole menace in their own way for the roads in the vicinity are sure to be wrecked because of the passage of vehicles carrying construction material.

It’s been ages since people had a smooth ride on Bannerghatta Road or the stretch from Jayadeva Institute to Silk Board with civic projects stretching on for ages. The set deadlines have long been forgotten and it’s time the ministers from Bengaluru and civic body heads put their heads together and came up with a plan to fast-track these projects.

And the best thing which could happen to the city now is a ‘Pothole Action Committee’ which will surely be heartily welcomed by every city resident.