Jamshedpur : Chief engineer (communication) Road Construction Department, Ranchi has floated tender for toll collection on the four-lane Tata-Kandra Road. The move only goes to show that the commuters on the Tata-Kandra Road will soon have to pay the toll tax.
According to sources in the road construction department, the validity of tender for two years and the estimated tender money for two years is Rs 15.52 crores.
Notably, over 2,000 heavy vehicles, including trailers, vans and other mode of vehicles every day-round-the-clock to Kandra-Tata four lane which is the artery of Adityapur industrial hub, linking to steel city of Jamshedpur on the one hand and NH-33 on the other hand through the Kandra-Chandil road.
Notably, the work of the 15-kilometre long Tata-Kandra Road’s main carriage lane is complete, but due to incompletion of the service lanes, the project is being considered as incomplete. After deadline of the Tata-Kandra Road project was over April 20 last year, the JARDCL had expedited the construction of service lane, which is still going on.
The ambitious Rs 185.5 crores Adityapur-Kandra four-lane project linking the steel city of Jamshedpur with that of Adityapur industrial area in the adjoining Seraikela-Kharsawan district, had begun in April 2011. The Jharkhand Accelerated Road Development Company Limited (JARDCL), which is a sister concern of the construction major Infrastructure and Leasing Financial Services (ILFS) was entrusted to complete the road within a time frame of two years, ending on April 20, 2013.
Though the JARDCL has already set up two toll plazas at the Kandra end on the 15.5 kilometre-long road six months ago for the purpose of the toll collection, the construction company has not been able to construct the service lane at a number of places, inlcuding the one along the Hathi-Ghora Temple in Gamharia.
About 50,000 people live in Gamharia in the adjoining Seraikela-Kharsawan district, and 10 percent of this population, which include school and college students have to negotiate through the existing Adityapur-Kandra road to reach either upto Adityapur industrial units or to the steel city.
Similarly, a large number of people living in Adityapur and Jamshedpur also have to go upto Gamharia for working in industrial units located along the Adityapur-Kandra road regularly.
” It is unfair the Road Construction department has not only completed the service lanes, but also has built the service-lane in a haste manner. From the manner the service lanes have been built, it seems that the road construction department is no way concerned with the people’s convenience and concerned about the heavy commercial vehicles only,” said Om Prakash, president of Jan Kalyan Morcha (JKM).
Om Prakash said that they have submitted a memorandum to the Seraikela-Kharsawan deputy commissioner, Hansraj Singh today and also to the road construction department, expressing the concern as the step of toll collection without completing the service lane will give rise to road mishap.