PWD assures HC of repairing internal Aarey Colony roads by June

MUMBAI: The Bombay high court has asked the Public Works Department (PWD) to inform it on the progress of the repair work on the internal roads in Aarey Colony by June after the department informed the HC that it had just got funds following the state budget and would commence repairing the 45-km long internal roads soon

MUMBAI: The Bombay high court has asked the Public Works Department (PWD) to inform it on the progress of the repair work on the internal roads in Aarey Colony by June after the department informed the HC that it had just got funds following the state budget and would commence repairing the 45-km long internal roads soon.

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The division bench of acting chief justice SV Gangapurwala and justice SV Marne was hearing petition filed by Binod Agarwal, a local resident, seeking directions to the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation to take over maintenance of the internal roads in Aarey Colony.

During the hearing, the bench was informed by the PWD, which is responsible for maintaining the roads, that an additional affidavit had been filed in response to the petition. The affidavit filed by Gunjan Dighavkar on behalf of PWD, stated that a proposal had been sent to the Dairy Development department for constructing and strengthening of the asphalt roads at a cost of ₹48.41 crore.

The affidavit further stated that the proposal was prepared in 2019 to resurface the road with a 75-mm thick Water Bound Macadam layer, 150 mm Thick Wet Mix Macadam layer and a 50 mm Thick Dense Bituminous Macadam layer along with 20 mm thick layer of Open Graded Premix Seal Coat with a 1.00 m side shoulder with Granular Sub-Base.

The affidavit added that in the above amount only 12 kms of road would be done and a new proposal for an additional ₹173 crore would be sent to the concerned authorities for remaining roads.

Responding to a query by the court, the counsel for PWD submitted that as some of the funds were already made available work had started and once the new proposal was sent for sanctioning and received through the state budget work would be started soon and was expected to get over before the monsoon.