Mira-Bhayandar Roads In Disrepair: Potholes And Poor Repairs Expose Failures By Contractors And Auditors

Mira Bhayandar: Roads riddled with countless multi-sized potholes have been testing the patience of motorists and pedestrians in Mira Road.

Heavy rains lashing twin-city have left most of the main and internal roads in a battered state and at some places thoroughly washed out, thus exposing the inferior quality of construction followed by cosmetic repairs by private contractual agencies appointed by the Mira Bhayandar Municipal Corporation and the Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA).

Notably a defect liability period (DLP) of all roads has been fixed and the concerned contractor is responsible for the maintenance of the same. However, the rules are brazenly flouted. Interestingly, not a single contractor has been blacklisted for shoddy road works, so far, this despite gross violations of defect liability clauses in the tender rules and breaches in guidelines laid down by the Indian Road Congress (IRC).

It should be noted that the DLP period which applies to contractors consists of a stipulated guarantee period for assured repairs and subsequent maintenance work. This is backed by a third-party audit to check the materials used and the quality of road work.

However, the private audit agencies are also under the scanner for issuing quality control reports of substandard road works thus facilitating a safe passage to bill payments.

Moreover, half-baked work for the construction of cement concrete roads have left stretches of roads across the twin-city in shambles. Experts feel that slapdash cosmetic repairs and unscientific methods of filling potholes is the primary reason due to which potholes continue to crop up on the twin-city's roads with alarming regularity.