NH 48 highway deaths & traffic: Thane MLA meets NHAI officials over Rs 600 crore project delays!

VASAI: Shiv Sena Boisar MLA Vilas Tare conducted a meet with NHAI officials and officials from the traffic department of Palghar and Mira Bhayandar Vasai Virar commissionerate to solve the issue of daily traffic jams on the Mumbai Ahmedabad national highway (NH48) even after spending 600 crores on the white topping. Representatives from the contractor Nirmal Build Infra were also present who are completing this white topping project, along with Suhas Chitnis, Project Director NHAI, the Highway police and the highway activists. For the last couple of days NH 48 witnessed traffic which was around 7/8 kilometers long with vehicle traffic on the wrong side on both the lanes. Highway deaths during this white topping project allegedly due to the negligence of the contractor and lack of safety measures on the site were also discussed.

The NHAI was asked as to why there should be no legal action taken against them and the contractor for the highway deaths, confirmed a source.This is one of the important routes which connects Mumbai to the Northern states like Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Delhi etc. In Palghar, this route connects one of the biggest MIDC which is the Boisar Tarapur MIDC and often loaded trucks get stuck in hours of traffic further causing delays and damages to the respective company.

One of the chronic spots is the construction of the Sativili flyover in Palghar, the service road of which is potholed and has witnessed several fatal incidents. We have given them an ultimatum of 15 days to complete the service roads else legal action would be taken for the delays, said Boisar MLA Vilas Tare. He also demanded 60 traffic wardens from NHAI, which have been missing in action when required, at the earliest.

Highway activist Harbans Singh said that this project of 600 crores was given so that we could travel smoothly and lives could be saved but at Sativali spot we have lost around 14 lives in recent time, so what have we achieved, he questioned.

Contractor spotted cementing in heavy rainsOn Thursday, when Palghar district was receiving heavy rainfall, a citizen captured a video of the contractor pouring cement from a ready mix concrete (RMC) truck on the site where they were constructing a nullah slab. The entire exercise was futile as the video shows the concrete being literally poured in water. Activists questioned this act adn this exposed the quality of work in progress. This happened on Thursday at Nandgaon which is five kilometers from Manor naka towards Gujarat.