Kundapur; Nov 23: Dissatisfied with the poor workmanship of Shiroor national highway and delay in repair works, residents of Shiroor staged a protest on Nov 21, Thursday.
From the past several months, commuters have been finding it difficult to travel due to the poor condition of the national highway from Byndoor to Shiroor. Elected representatives and officials had assured that the repair work would start from November 15.
But as the work got delayed, annoyed residents decided to stage a protest on Nov 21, Thursday. After all these developments, department has launched its repair works on Nov 21, Thursday. Thus, the planned protest has been withdrawn.
The repair work by the NH department, on NH from Shiroor Sunkadagundi was not only complete rubbish but also gravel pieces and mud were scattered all over on highway making travel even more difficult. As the repair work which started after several months of delay, condemning the inferior quality of workmanship, people joined hands and protested on Nov 22,Friday and organized a procession from Kelapete to market place.
Shops Closed:
Shopkeepers, who too tired of the dust rising from the roads, closed their shops and joined with the protestors. All the shops in shiroor and market road were closed till the end of the protest and thus expressed their solidarity. Protestors demanded the officials to re-tar the road and warned of that protest will continue until they get clear justification on the matter.
Assurance from Krishna Rao for appropriate work from Sunday:
Responding to people’s problems,NH Kundapur zone engineer Y Krishna Rao said the tender process for Kundapur-Goa four lane work has already been completed and for the complete re-tarring of the road, the department is facing crunch in funds. The tender process of repair work is in the final stage. Therefore only patch work is possible now, he said.
Dissatisfied with the justification given by Krishna Rao, protestors took the department officials to task and said that protest will be stopped only when the officials repaired the road properly. Later the engineer contacted the contractor and other officials over the phone and assured the protestors to start the re-tarring of the road in some of the highly damaged places only from Sunday.
