BMC has floated a INR 1,224-crore tender for concreting 261 roads in the eastern suburbs. This is in addition to the 182 roads in the eastern suburbs where concreting works are currently underway.
The new tender covers about 72km of roads. “These roads had to be concretised, so we have taken up this work in the second phase,” said a civic official.
Soon after taking charge as chief minister in 2022, Eknath Shinde directed BMC to concretise all roads the in next two years to make Mumbai pothole free.
Subsequently, municipal corporation floated five tenders worth a total INR 5,800 crore to concretise 400km of roads, but three months later, cancelled them allegedly owing to poor response.
In Nov 2022, BMC invited five new tenders worth INR 6,080 crore for concreting 397km of roads across the city, including 182 roads in the eastern suburbs (covering about 70km) and awarded the contracts to Eagle Infra India for eastern suburbs, Megha Engineering and Infra, Dineshchandra R Agrawal Infracon, and NCC for western suburbs and Roadway Solutions India Infrastructure for the island city.
However, BMC cancelled the contract of about INR 1,600 crore awarded to Roadway Solutions for concreting 97km of roads in the island city and levied a penalty for failing to start work even 10 months after issuing work orders.
The civic body, about two weeks ago, floated a fresh tender of INR 1,363 crore, excluding GST, for concretising 235 roads in the island city.
Meanwhile, local residents alleged that the work is moving at a slow pace causing inconvenience to people and motorists.
Mandeep Singh Makkar, founder of Chandivli Citizens’ Welfare Association, said: “It’s been a year now that an Ulhasnagar-based contractor has been given the mega project of concreting roads in the eastern suburbs. The contractor has been working at a snail’s pace, causing huge inconvenience to motorists and pedestrians.”
Makkar added: “As per the BMC agreement, it is the duty of the contractor to maintain the roads from the day the concreting work order is accepted by him and till the concrete roads are handed over to BMC, but roads are not maintained. The contractor lacks experience in working in traffic-bound cities like Mumbai.”
