Ahluwalia seeks Centre’s Help For repairing highways damaged during 2010 landslides

SNS, Kolkata/Behrampore, 19 August 2014: With the NH-55 still not being repaired, BJP MP from Darjeeling Mr SS Ahluwalia has requested the Union Transport Minister Nitin Gadakari for providing funds for repairing the roads that were damaged in 2010 landslides.

A week back, Mr Ahluwalia wrote a letter to Mr Gadkari requesting them to provide around Rs 50 lakh for repairing the two National Highways.

The National Highway of India connects NH 31 at Matiagara in the outskirts of Siliguri in Darjeeling district with Darjeeling. According to Mr Ahluwalia, they have approached the state government several times to approach the Centre regarding the matter, but the latter failed to do so. Therefore, he had to approach Mr Gadkari directly so that they could sent the funds as early as possible.

Earlier the Centre had sanctioned Rs 63 lakh for repairing work at Paglajhora at NH-55, but it had not started yet and so they have requested to provide more funds.

The closure of the highway has caused inconvenience to the locals for the last two years.

Tindharia has three high schools and a railway hospital. People from areas like Mahanadi, Gayabari and Chunabatti are being forced to use a circuitous route through Kurseong and Sukna to reach Tindharia. Residents have to shell out Rs 100 to travel between Mahanadi and Tindharia, instead of a fare of Rs 20 on the normal route.

With the closure of the NH55, heavy vehicles ferrying essential commodities from Siliguri to Darjeeling are being forced to use the long route of Mungpoo and Mirik. This has led to escalation of the prices of essential commodities in the Hills.

Mr Ahluwalia added that the 500 m stretch at Paglajhora was washed away in a landslide on 16 June 2010, after which the highway has been shut between Siliguri and Kurseong.

Congress MP, Mr Adhir Chowdhury too faxed a letter to Mr Gadkari, urging him to initiate repair works on stretches of NH-34 which are in deplorable condition.

The NH-34 passing through North 24-Parganas, Nadia, Murshidabad, Malda, North and South Dinajpur districts of West Bengal connects the Eastern Region with the rest parts of India, stated the letter. Apart from serving the purpose of passengers and goods transport, the Highway bears some strategic importance as the military bases on the border depend a lot on this high road running almost parallel to the Indo-Bangla international border, the Congress MP maintained, drawing the attention of the Union minister to the broken stretches of NH-34 which need urgent reconstruction.

Mr Chowdhury’s letter to Mr Gadkari, however, was silent on the issue of land acquisition which has plagued the HCC-NHAI deal made on Public-Private-Partnership model of development works.