Chief Minister Pramod Sawant on Wednesday got cracking and wrote to PWD Minister Nilesh Cabral seeking a probe into major road works sanctioned during the last three years and set a timeline of 45 days for submission of the report. In a related development, the CM has directed that an Assistant Engineer and a Junior Engineer of the PWD be placed under suspension pending inquiry over substandard work of the 27-kilometre long Chorla Ghat-Sanquelim road. The CM noted that the quality of work has been compromised since the bituminous concrete layer of the road has slipped away in many places.
It was a sheer coincidence that Sawant who was travelling to Belgaum and back a couple of days ago via the Chorla route got a first-hand experience of the shoddy road works. Rather, we must thank his appointment with Belgaum that a first serious step has been taken towards fixing accountability for the quality of roads, an issue that the PWD has been paying lip service to all along.
However, we wonder why the CM was not prompted into similar action when he has been a witness to the pathetic condition of major roads and highways in Goa throughout the year, especially when there is a chorus of people crying out for better roads. Potholed roads have been haunting citizens and motorists right through, and all the public has got are deadlines and assurances from the PWD. If we may recall, by the government’s own admission of poor roads, it had decided to keep the new Motor Vehicle Act in abeyance.
A case in point is the newly built concrete-top highway which is being showcased as Goa’s infrastructure development project. Motorists may have got space for mobility, but the roads have turned out to be bumpy with a completely uneven surface. Ironically, this issue has been raised by members of the Opposition who are now part of this government. This is certainly not the infrastructure upgrade that Goa wanted, and we are baffled to understand how such a vast expanse of road extending from North to South Goa is overlooked for quality checks. Goa cannot let this pass on the premise of the highway being a national project.
The Chief Minister’s sudden decision to seek accountability and fix responsibility is most welcome provided it is taken to its logical conclusion. For a government that boasts about growth and infrastructure, quality checks are paramount and this probe should have come much earlier. The question here is, why was the government silent, and why were contractors not held liable if they are bound by the terms of the contract?
Suspending two officers cannot be the end of the issue. The government must probe deeper and even investigate the role of former PWD ministers. A mechanism must be put in place to plug loopholes in the system that lead to compromises in quality. The commission system in contracts, which has recently been a point of political discourse, must be abolished. The nuts and bolts within the system must be tightened.
We hope the chief minister, after his Chorla road experience, takes a drive down other Goa highways too.
