Delhi Chief Minister Atishi announced that starting Monday, she and her cabinet ministers will hit the streets to inspect the capital’s roads. This comes after AAP convenor Arvind Kejriwal sent her a letter urging immediate repairs for the damaged roads. Government engineers and local MLAs will join the ministers during these inspections, and they plan to kick off repair work right after assessing the situation.
The decision to inspect the roads came out of a meeting on Sunday at the Delhi Secretariat, where Atishi chaired discussions with all the ministers, along with the Delhi Chief Secretary and officials from the Public Works Department (PWD). They conducted a thorough review of 1,400 kilometers of PWD roads.
During the meeting, they identified which roads need a complete rebuild, which sections require 100-200 meters of repair, and where potholes need to be fixed. “We’ve decided that the Delhi government will deliver pothole-free roads to the people before Diwali,” Atishi stated confidently.
She noted that rain has created potholes all over the city. “Agencies like the Delhi Jal Board, Tata Power, and BSES dug up roads but left them unrepaired after their work. This has really hurt the condition of Delhi’s roads,” she added.
Atishi revealed that Kejriwal had handed her the letter in the Assembly on Friday, emphasizing the need to tackle road repairs urgently. She will oversee inspections in South and South East Delhi, while Saurabh Bhardwaj will check out East Delhi.
Gopal Rai is set to inspect North East Delhi, Kailash Gehlot will cover West and South West Delhi, and Imran Hussain will take care of Central and New Delhi. Newly appointed minister Mukesh Ahlawat will look into the roads in North and North-West Delhi.
According to Atishi, the inspections will begin at 6 a.m. on Monday, with local MLAs and PWD engineers, including the Chief Engineer, joining the ministers. They plan to complete the inspections within a week. Once they wrap up, repair work on these 1,400 kilometers of PWD roads will start immediately, with plans to assign repair jobs by October.