Staff Reporter
GUWAHATI: The condition of national highways has always been under question in Assam. The latest accident on the national highway at Khetri in the Kamrup Metro district has raised the question afresh. The August 30 accident at Khetri, which involved a passenger-carrying traveller and a loaded truck, resulted in the loss of seven lives. The local people attributed the numerous potholes pockmarking the national highway as the cause.
Time overruns and concerns about quality work are two phenomena common in most national highway projects in Assam. If a man drives from Khanapara to Nagaon, the national highway will let him know how uneven and pockmarked the road is.
According to sources, the national highways in Assam have as many as 331 black corridors. The question that arises here is: do the road development agencies take long-term and short-term measures to fix these black corridors or black spots?
According to the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways (MoRTH), road developers carry out all NH works as per standards, guidelines, manuals, and codes of practice of the Indian Roads Congress (IRC) as well as specifications for road and bridge works. The developers also take road safety measures during design, construction, operation and maintenance stages. Guidelines have been issued for regular safety audits of all NHs at the design, construction, and pre-opening stage of NH projects as well as on existing NHs for ensuring road safety.
Short-term measures for immediate rectification include road markings, signages, crash barriers, road studs, delineators, closure of unauthorized median openings, traffic calming measures, etc. Long-term measures like improvement of road geometrics, junction improvements, spot widening of carriageways, construction of underpasses/overpasses, etc., are also taken as permanent rectification measures as per site requirements. Long-term rectification works involve pre-construction activities such as land acquisition, forest clearance and utility shifting, which take significant time.
Another question is: do the road developing agencies like the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI), National Highways and Infrastructure Development Corporation Ltd (NHIDCL) and the Assam PWD NH Division follow the guidelines of the Union ministry in Assam? Potholes on national highways in Assam become prominent in many stretches during every monsoon. If anyone drives from the Guwahati Airport to Chhaygaon, he will get a horrible experience of road hazards due to potholes.
According to sources, the numbers of black corridors on NH are - 3 in Bajali, 4 in Baksa, 6 in Biswanath, 1 in Bongaigaon, 17 in Cachar, 1 in Charaideo, 3 in Chirang, 22 in Darrang, 3 in Dhemaji, 32 in Dhubri, 5 in Dibrurgarh, 12 in Goalpara, 14 in Golaghat, 25 in Guwahati city, in Hailakandi, 14 in Hojai, 8 in Jorhat, 47 in Kamrup, 5 in Kokrajhar, 19 in Lakhimpur, 10 in Morigaon, 21 in Nagaon, 12 in Nalbari, 5 in Sonitpur, 15 in Sribhumi, 2 in Tamulpur, and 1 in Tinsukia.
Of late, under public pressure from the Khetri area, the district administration and the NHAI have been showing some sort of agility on their part. The current priority is to monitor how the authorities can repair the potholes and the uneven sections of the national highway from Khanapara to Khetri within a specific timeframe. This stretch is only one section. The state has several potholed and uneven NH stretches, besides the black corridors. All these stretches need immediate corrective measures before it is too late.
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