PWD on its way to strengthen & widen 2,000 km of district roads

Kolkata: The state Public Works Department (PWD) has set another milestone by initiating widening and strengthening of 2,000 km of roads that they have taken over from Zilla Parishads, at a record time.

This is the first time in Bengal's history when the state government has decided to take over district roads from Zilla Parishads and hand them over to the state PWD, to carry out widening and strengthening of the roads.

There are many places where completely new roads will be constructed. Maintenance of the roads will also be carried out by the state PWD.

It may be mentioned that the decision to handover Zilla Parishad roads to the state PWD was taken in 2017, as a part of the initiatives to ensure development of rural roads.

Senior officials of the state government had realised that Zilla Parishads didn't have the necessary infrastructure for widening and strengthening of the roads. Hence, the PWD was given the responsibility to construct, strengthen and widen the roads.

So far, the state PWD has taken up 381 roads in different districts, the total length of which measures 3,366 km.

Out of it, the work of widening and strengthening of 2,000 km of roads has already been started.

The work of around 200 km is already complete and work in the remaining parts is also going on in full swing.

The 3,366 km of roads are from all districts, apart from Darjeeling. The districts in which the work on stretches of Zilla Parishad roads has been taken up by the state PWD, include Birbhum, Bankura, Purulia, East and West Burdwan and East and West Midnapore.

According to a senior official of PWD, the task of taking over the roads was time consuming, as the state PWD officials had to go through all documents of the lands through which the roads pass.

The Zilla Parishads had submitted all documents, including the mouza maps of the area, to the concerned officials of the PWD. The roads were taken up only if there was no dispute of land and no privately owned land through which they pass.

The officials of the state PWD have carried out survey of the places where the roads are being strengthened and widened. Based on the survey report, the decision was taken on which roads will be concrete ones and which ones will be bituminous.

The cost to construct a 1 km long stretch of bituminous road of 3 metre width is around Rs 1 crore and the cost goes up to Rs 1.5 crore to Rs 1.8 crore, if it is a concrete road.