Kolkata Municipal Corporation has deployed 13 vehicles for night-time road repairs as it races to address potholes and damaged stretches before the Durga Puja season, after repeated rain disrupted the civic body’s September deadline.
Municipal administrator Smita Pandey said on Thursday that repair work was continuing every night whenever weather conditions allowed. She made the statement after inspecting several roads along the Eastern Metropolitan Bypass.
“We had initially thought that all roads would be repaired by 30 September. But work has been stalled from time to time because of rain,” Pandey said, according to Anandabazar. She added that municipal workers were carrying out repairs at night when there was no rainfall.
The 13 vehicles are being used for the repair operation, while officials from the municipal boroughs are conducting regular inspections of roads in their respective areas. The civic body had been instructed to complete repairs before the festive season, but adverse weather has slowed work and increased pressure on its public works department.
The first week of October is expected to be important for the repair programme, municipal officials said. The timing is significant for Kolkata’s road network because the period immediately before Durga Puja brings heavier movement of pedestrians, buses, cars and commercial vehicles across neighbourhoods and arterial routes. The supplied report does not specify the number of potholes or the total road length still awaiting repairs.
Residents can report road-related complaints through several municipal channels. The telephone numbers listed by the corporation are 22861212, 22861313 and 22861414. Complaints can also be made through the civic call-centre numbers 22269909 and 22861000, the toll-free number 18003453375 and WhatsApp at 8335999111.
Pandey said the municipal control room and the public grievance system had been merged. This is intended to bring road complaints into the same civic response mechanism, although the report does not provide details on complaint response times, work-order tracking or how residents will be informed after a repair is completed.
The corporation will also conduct a ‘Seba Setu’ outreach programme from 2 to 4 October at 157 locations across Kolkata. Camps will operate in different wards on 2 and 3 October, with participation from 15 departments, including health and family welfare, higher education, finance, forests, and micro, small and medium enterprises.
The camps will include health counters offering dengue and tuberculosis testing, as well as e-KYC services. Eye-testing facilities may also be arranged where space is available. Residents will additionally be able to access information and assistance related to RERA provisions under a central housing scheme. Pandey said the camps would help the administration understand residents’ requirements. The municipal corporation’s next stated priority is to continue road repairs during dry weather and assess progress through inspections in the opening week of October.