Nagaland Congress Pradesh Committee (NPCC) has said the tall promises made by the DAN Government on the development front and chief minister Neiphiu Rio’s latest claim on the magnitude of works taken up under the Roads and Buildings sectors over the past 4-5 years of DAN Ministry, were more of a “political rhetoric” than genuine commitment or actual deliverance.
“The achievement of a Government is measured by its actual development delivered to its citizens. It is a question of whether the State Government accords its priority to the people’s welfare programme at the ground level,” NPCC media cell chairman R Paphino said in a press release.
Apart from the “dismal performance” of many major departments, NPCC said the efficacy of the Roads and Bridges department was at its lowest ebb as despite having hundreds of crore at its kitty for the last few years, the road condition every where in Nagaland had not seen any improvement.
“The recent protest of the people of Tuensang area, recent road repairing programmes being carried out by the youth organizations and villagers in different areas, including by-pass of NH 39 are all clear indication of horrible roads conditions and non- existence of the State authority, PWD
Engineers and their field staff,’ NPCC said.
The Congress party also pointed out that even in the State capital Kohima, the condition of the main road (NH-39) was “little better than a stretch of river and in some portion of the town, the roads are fit for cattle path.”
Hitting out at the government and PWD Department for “miserably failing” to live up to the expectation of the people with regard to roads, NPCC also alleged that the State authority was too feeble to monitor and tune up the works and projects being carried out by the BRTF in the NH-39 and other State Highways.
“In Nagaland, neo-standard culture of road construction and blacktopping is confined to thin carpeting and potholes fillings. Government standard specifications and quality control mechanism seems to have been ceased to function and therefore, road quality maintenance becomes a thing of the past,” it added.
NPCC was of the view that until and unless there was “drastic behavioral changes” at the top level, there was little chance of changes taking place at the ground level as far as the road condition in Nagaland was concerned.
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