Forest dept to promote human-elephant coexistence
To mitigate human-elephant conflicts, the forest department has planned to organise a 'Hati-Bandhu Mela,' a festival dedicated to elephants, aimed at raising awareness among the public.
Incessant rainfall this monsoon has so far left several roads in Siliguri damaged, with potholes and craters almost everywhere. Keeping this in mind, the Siliguri Municipal Corporation (SMC) has constituted a panel of engineers to carry out a road-condition assessment in all 47 wards.
According to SMC officials, the assessment will help prepare repair plans before the festive season. According to the irrigation and waterways department, Siliguri received 2606.80 mm of rainfall till 22 August this year.
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A case in point is the site of a flyover construction on Bardhaman Road, where the craters have been causing huge traffic snarls every day, while motorists have complained of the bad condition of the road stretch.
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“The construction work of the flyover is underway and two-way vehicles are plying on one single lane of the road, creating a bottleneck. The existing road surface in the area is riddled with multiple craters and that needs immediate repair,” said a motorist.
“Haphazard plying of the totos (e-rickshaws) has made matters worse at some places,” another motorist, who uses the road stretch every day to go to work, added.
Apart from regular maintenance, the roads usually get repaired twice a year–before the monsoon and before Durga Puja. Civic body officials said the battered roads will get a coat of patchwork before the pujas. The patchwork, however, usually lasts for only a few months. The civic body is also receiving complaints about damaged roads at the Paraai Samadhan camp.
“We have already formed a panel of engineers and they are conducting a detailed study of the condition of roads. The heavy downpour has made the condition of the roads worse. The survey will identify such roads and evaluate the nature of the damage. The repair work will be completed before the festive season,” said a member of the board of administrators of the civic body, Ranjan Sarkar.
Many motorists and commuters have complained that the crater-filled roads were not only slowing down traffic movement but also posing a danger of causing accidents.
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