JOIN USWith Chief Minister Siddaramaiah cracking the whip, the BBMP began fixing potholes on Wednesday.
But don’t expect smooth, safe roads in a fortnight: the BBMP is going by the letter of his instruction, and only filling up ditches that technically qualify as potholes.
Four people have died since last week in accidents attributed to potholes.
On Tuesday, Siddaramaiah gave the municipal authorities 15 days to fill up all potholes, but the BBMP has found a clever workaround.
BBMP commissioner N Manjunath Prasad chaired a day-long meeting on Wednesday with mayor Sampath Raj, engineers and corporators.
“We will just fill up potholes as defined by the BBMP,” a BBMP engineer said at the meeting. His suggestion was accepted by the others present at the meeting.
That means many stretches will remain as they are, fraught with risk for those riding two-wheelers.
According to the BBMP, a pothole is a crater that appears on a smooth flowing, tarred road. The crater has to be created by wear and tear, increased vehicular movement or heavy rainfall.
“If a pot-shaped hole or crater shows up on a smooth road, it is termed a pothole,” the mayor said.
The BBMP will not repair dug-up roads. “Roads are dug up by organisations such as the Bangalore Water Supply and Sewerage Board (BWSSB) and Bangalore Electricity Supply Company Ltd (Bescom). It is their responsibility to tar them and they will have to do it now,” he said.
The problem of bad roads will be addressed later, when work begins on concretising roads, he told the meeting.
BBMP engineers also sought leniency in Indian Road Congress (IRC) standards.
“When it rains and time is short, we cannot follow IRC standards. We can’t dig up the roads to repair them. So, we will just fill up holes and tar the patches,” the engineer said.