DailyPost 2949
POTHOLED BANGALORE – UNASHAMEDLY YOURS!
The Pothole App will certainly be the icing on the cake, a tribute to Bangalore’s other contribution with IT technology and software globally. In a world of healthy competition that technology is, road engineering of this abysmal quality of roads stands out as an antidote. When the whole world is up in arms to declare the demise of the potholes, it has the tenacity and resilience to keep carrying on, relentlessly, endlessly and taking the pride of the place. It has withstood the onslaught of a whole load of doomsdayers, from the petty contractors – fillers experts to the highest court in the state, eagerly waiting for their closure using time proven yet failed tools like affidavit.
Good work never goes unnoticed, that too when much effort is made in a different direction, strangely the results pop up somewhere else. The shine and larger life image of the city, given the tech / IT prowess gave way to notoriety it gained in the world of traffic snarls, and started making it to the top of the charts globally. It has become a butt of ridicule, for a doctor running to reach his operation theatre, attending online meetings while on a two wheeler in a traffic jam and endless other anecdotes. The permanently incomplete Ejipura-Hosur Road is another feather in the cap for planners and executors of the city. A logjam of a few hours of a few lakh vehicle hours on the Outer Ring Road is what traffic infamy is all about.
Roads between potholes can be the apt description of India’s model city taking giant strides to make India a developed nation. From software, traffic took the pride of the place to be beaten for the top infamous slot by potholes. The story would have never lost its sheen in the public domain with our local self government, state government, various other agencies, contractors and politicians always putting their best foot forward” in this Pothole World Cup.” But all good things should come to an end and lo and behold, here comes the regular rains, which Bangalore has been experiencing for times immemorial and we deftly transformed it into floods.
So now there are no potholes but sheer mayhem on the roads and the whole city is gripped in a state of fear / deadlock /desperation. Nobody has any solution, nobody who matters would listen to it either. Who would like to grope in this nebulous world of government planning and legendary execution more so at the local self government level. But something needs to be shown; done, not done or undone is a different story. Visits by VVIPS, some motors pumping water, some compensation payments, in case of tragedy suspending some lowly officer and similar monkey tricks. The floods are managed for the year, keeping intact the greased backyard.
PERMANENTLY POTHOLED ROADS ARE AN ENGINEERING MARVEL, UNPARALLELED BY ANY GLOBAL CITY.
Sanjay Sahay
Have a nice evening.