Highway four-laning project: DC Ramban seeks proper maintenance of existing road to avoid traffic disruption

Ramban : Deputy Commissioner, Nazim Zai Khan Friday instructed the National Highway Authority of India and the construction agencies associated with the Highway (NH-44) four-laning project to ensure maintenance of the existing road to avoid traffic disruption.
He asked the concerned to take all measures to keep the road traffic worthy, while chairing a meeting of Revenue and Officers of National Highway Authority of India (NHAI), besides representatives of construction companies.
ADC, Ashok Sharma; Project Director (PD) NHAI; Parshotam Kumar; Tehsildar, Rafiq Ahmed; CHO, Xen, PWD, and officers of various departments attended the meeting.
The DC also sought the status of the Four-laning Project from NHAI and asked for its speedy completion without affecting the environment as well as normal traffic movement on the road to avoid inconvenience to the public.
He directed the agencies to adhere to the guidelines of the National Green Tribunal and conditions of the contract agreement to avoid criminal proceedings. Agencies were also directed to enhance water sprinkling on the road to minimize the dust besides dumping the muck at only identified dumping yards.
The Deputy Commissioner also reviewed section wise progress on the four-laning of Jammu-Srinagar National Highway including Nashri-Ramban, Ramban-Banihal and Banihal-Qazigund section.
Issues related to land acquisition, removal of structures and felling of trees in Right of Way (RoW) and shifting of power transmission towers were also discussed in detail.
He also expressed concern over delay in the process of shifting of towers, felling of trees, etc. causing unnecessary hindrances in smooth progress of work. He constituted various teams of officers to remove all bottlenecks hindering progress of construction works.
With regard to progress on additional land acquisition cases process, the DC asked collector land to expedite the process so that the land falling in the alignment of the project is handed over to NHAI at the earliest to undertake construction works.
Earlier, the officers of construction agencies apprised the Deputy Commissioner with regard to the progress and issues related to execution of work in their respective working areas.