Tripura suffers due to bad Assam road: Tathagata Roy

SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT

SILCHAR, Aug 22: “People of Tripura have to suffer due to bad road in Barak Valley. It is no doubt a paradoxical situation,” pointed out Tripura Governor Tathagata Roy while speaking on the topic ‘Road and bridge construction: Two key elements of infrastructure’ on the occasion of the 3rd Pritam Bhattacharjee memorial lecture held under the aegis of Keshab Smarak Samiti in the packed District Library auditorium here last evening. Though he did not mention about the quality of the road (NH 6), the lifeline of supply to Tripura via this valley, he spoke of building basic infrastructure for all weather sustaible connectivity.

Highways, as the Governor said, are constructed and maintained by PWD or NHAI. According to him, considering the high density of traffic movement on highway, use of materials application of geometry on structure and magement of traffic conflicts are important factors.

With his wide experience and knowledge on road engineering, Tathagata Roy suggested construction of road could be made with bitumen or pitch, concrete and stone sets. Of them, the last one is the best to construct road or highway.

The focus of the Governor quite obviously was on NH 6 from Churaibari, the entry point to Tripura, to Badarpur in Barak Valley in worst shape which prompted him to say, “Road of Assam, problem for Tripura.” He rrated his experiences about on the spot visit of NH 6 from Tripura border and was aghast to see its condition. He tried to exert pressure on the Assam Government notwithstanding his limitations. This was before the assembly elections of 2016. Tripura was in the grip of severe crisis of petroleum products.

The bottleneck was that hundreds of loaded trucks with goods were stranded and stuck up for days, Tathagata Roy said. Continuing, he also threw light on proper magement of traffic conflicts. These are time separation, sigling, grade separation, fly over and inter change. The last method is highly complex and expensive. The only of its kind is in Houston of Texas in America. Most importantly, for faster and easier traffic flow, bridge of quality is also essential. He cited three classic bridges in the world, Forth bridge in Scotland, Mostar bridge in Bosnia and Bandra-Worli sea link in Mumbai.

Though the Governor of Tripura laid stress on application of stone sets in the repair and improvement of NH 6 from Churaibari, Parimal Suklabaidya, Minister of PWD, Excise and Fisheries, speaking as guest of honour referred to the use of geo-textile and geo-cell.

The memorial function started with the lighting of auspicious lamp by Tathagata Roy which was followed by rendering of patriotic and devotiol songs. Khounish Chandra Chakraborty, president, Keshab Smarak Samiti, welcomed all the honourable guests and invitees.

Sankar Bhattacharjee said from the Pritam Bhattacharjee memorial fund, meritorious students are awarded a gold medal and cash prize of Rs.5,000 each, besides persons with economically weak background as well as victims of tural disaster are also extended fincial help. On this occasion five students for their outstanding performances in their respective examitions at the graduation and post graduation levels were awarded. They are Rimpi Deb, Tapati Dey, Rahesa Tabussam Mazumder, Debakanta Singha and Piyali Deb. Swapan Suklabaidya, general secretary, Keshab Smarak Samiti, offered vote of thanks.