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Time of India
4 days ago
- General
- Time of India
Quick fix on newly concretised Dahisar road triggers outrage
Mumbai: Patchwork repairs on the newly concretised Holy Cross Road in Dahisar triggered public outrage on Thursday, with former BMC Congress corporator Sheetal Mhatre slamming the civic body for masking, rather than fixing construction flaws. Tired of too many ads? go ad free now Under phase one of the concretisation project of Mumbai roads, Holy Cross Road was taken up for repairs. Barely a few months ago, the concrete road was laid, but residents were shocked when a day ago they saw mastic asphalt being laid on the same concrete road. The reason for it, the BMC said, was the absence of a drainage line, owing to which water was stagnating. As a temporary fix, the contractor is laying asphalt. "Under the Mumbai beautification plan, the footpath was to be laid along with the drainage line. Therefore, when the road was proposed for concretisation, the laying of the drainage line wasn't taken up. However, now as the work is completed, it has come to light that the final road level isn't proper. As a temporary measure, the mastic is being laid, but we are trying to see what could be a permanent solution to this. That work would be done once the monsoon months are over," said a BMC official. Mhatre, however, explaining the mess, said the fact that the final road level wasn't proper only came to light now as the rains have arrived. "There is water stagnation at multiple spots on the new road. The root issues were clear — poorly laid PQC (Pavement Quality Concrete), incorrect camber and slope gradient, and inadequate stormwater inlets. Instead of correcting these as per tender norms, the contractor has simply applied mastic asphalt patching — a cost-cutting shortcut to avoid proper rework," said Mhatre. Residents fear that the stopgap solution will lead to quicker road damage, especially during monsoon. However, BMC said that if these measures weren't taken, it could have led to water accumulation again on a heavy rain day. As a part of the BMC's ambitious concretisation project, close to 700km of Mumbai roads are being concretised at a cost of over Rs 12,000 crore.
Time of India
06-05-2025
- Politics
- Time of India
Over 3-year-gap the longest BMC has gone without elected body
Over 3-year-gap the longest BMC has gone without elected body MUMBAI: The impending elections to the country's richest municipal corporation will finally end the all-powerful role of the state govt-appointed administrator (municipal commissioner) who was indirectly governing the BMC for the past three 7, 2025, marked three full years without an elected civic body in Mumbai -an unprecedented stretch in the history of the city's this time, the BMC awarded contracts worth more than Rs 12,000 crore for road repairs and concretisation, its liabilities surged to an all-time high of Rs 2 lakh crore, and for the first time, a guardian minister set up office inside the civic the opposition has time and again raised its voice against the lack of accountability and transparency in the running of the civic corporation which was under the administrator, nothing much changed on the Congress corporator from Dahisar, Sheetal Mhatre , said civic officials gave the short shrift to former elected representatives like her. She said they received no replies to their complaints. "We were forced to file RTIs whose replies would also take a long time. If as a former elected representative the civic administration didn't find it important to even engage with us, what can the public expect?" she Shaikh, two-time former corporator and now MLA, said, "Without corporators, the administration threw open in a haphazard way infrastructure projects like the Coastal Road in the past three years leading to a loss of face for Mumbai. The Prime Minister's Office took notice of the shoddy quality of Coastal Road forcing civic-appointed contractors to redo the road," he MLA from Mumbadevi Amin Patel said their poll preparations are already underway. "I aim to increase corporator seats in my constituency. Last municipal polls we lost a seat by 500 votes. This time we are taking no chances."Ravi Raja, former opposition leader in the BMC, now with the BJP, said while major projects like Coastal Road and road concretisation got a push from the state govt, local area issues suffered. "Corporators each year get a fixed sum which they can use for local area development works. Especially in pockets where there are slums or tenanted properties such funds are used for road repairs, toilets, drainage and water pipeline. Since three years these issues are being ignored," he said. Corporators would get development funds of Rs 1 crore to carry out minor works like repairs and maintenance of roads, footpaths, streetlights, cleaning minor drainage systems in their wards. Every year they also get a corporator fund of Rs 60 lakh to use for social and cultural Mhaske, CEO of NGO Praja Foundation which used to bring out report cards on corporators based on a set of parameters like questions a corporator raised, meetings attended and so on, said, "For elected representatives, stakes are high and they try to oblige the voter to ensure they are elected in the next election too. The administration has nothing to win or lose if they solve a citizen's grievance."
