Ludhiana road cave-in: Civic body officials’ nonchalance to blame, say residents

Ahead of the Ludhiana road cave-in, municipal corporation commissioner Pardeep Sabharwal has issued show cause notices to three civic body officials of the bridges and road department for negligence

The road cave-in at Deep Nagar, which sent three people plunging down a deep chasm, sent shock waves through the city with residents blaming the nonchalance of civic body officials who disregarded their complaints for the mishap.

Residents suspect that the sewer lines had been damaged in the incident and the soil below the road had gradually eroded, which caused the Ludhiana road cave-in. (Gurpreet Singh/HT)

Area residents say the same portion of the road had caved-in when the road was being constructed around six months ago and a tractor-trailer had fallen in the pit. Residents suspect that the sewer lines had been damaged in the incident and the soil below the road had gradually eroded, which caused the cave-in.

Sunil, who lives in the area, said, “We had flagged the issue when we noticed a depression on the road, but authorities and the contractor did not check the condition of the water and sewer pipes and reconstructed the road.” 

Some area residents say that water supply to a house adjoining the cave-in spot had been disrupted and when the owner of the house brought repairmen, they found the portion beneath the road hollow. The owner of the said house, Manjul, said that he had apprised the councillor and MC officials regarding the same, but repair was postponed to Thursday as the work could not be done during the night, but the mishap took place around 8am, before repair work could start.

Area councillor Indu Thapar’s husband, Raju Thapar, said they had received no complaint from the residents and no MC employee had been deputed to repair the water supply line in the area. “There might have been some leakage in the sewer lines as it is decades old,” said Thapar.

Show cause notices issued

Municipal corporation commissioner Pardeep Sabharwal has issued show cause notices to three officials of the bridges and road department for negligence. The notices have been issued to executive engineer Raman Kaushal, sub-divisional officer Sanjeev Kumar and junior engineer Ankush Sharma. The officials have been given two days to submit a reply.

In the notices, Sabharwal cited two road cave-in incident, including the one which reported in Deep Nagar on Thursday and the other reported in Haibowal area on October 24 where a man and his son had a narrow escape after their car got stuck in a pit and overturned after the road caved in.

He directed officials to properly barricade the area before carrying out repair works.