Ghaziabad: Dug up for the CM GRID project for months, the roads in trans-Hindon areas like Indirapuram have turned into mudslides after a continuous drizzle on Wednesday. Waterlogging added to the civic mess, but the residents fear that as monsoon picks up pace, the worst is yet to come.Outside Supertech apartments in Nyay Khand, fruit seller Mangesh has set up his cart on a road that has remained dug up for over six months and is barely used by commuters.“Earlier, the road was made with bitumen, but this time the municipality has constructed an RCC road,” he said. “Cement roads leave a gap between the pavement and the carriageway, which becomes uneven over time and with rain, the loose soil turns into mud.”He added that the uneven muddy surfaces scrape the bottom of vehicles and damage them. “I don’t understand why they did not use bitumen,” he said, unaware of the bitumen shortage that has delayed projects across the city.Only one side of the road is being used for traffic, while the other has turned into a long stretch of stagnant water after a continuous drizzle on Wednesday.“This was expected,” a resident of Patrakar Vihar, Sanjjev Sinha, said. “GMC did not complete the work before monsoon. Right now it is only drizzling, but once heavy rain starts, this entire stretch will become a swamp. We are bracing ourselves to walk up to Sai Chowk in gumboots.”The CISF Road, one of Indirapuram’s main arterial roads connecting NH-9 to Vasundhara, was also inundated on Tuesday. Apart from a tractor-mounted dewatering pump, there was little evidence of measures to tackle waterlogging or expedite the unfinished roadwork.GMC has been carrying out road and sewer upgrades across nearly 13 km of Indirapuram under the CM Green Road Infrastructure Development Scheme (Urban Phase-I). The ongoing works include the 4-km Bala Ji Mandir-NH-9 stretch via Kaveri Marg and Kala Patthar, the 2-km Kala Patthar-Shaheed Capt Mangal Pandey Marg stretch via Sushila Naiyar Marg, the 1.8-km Kala Patthar-Shaheed Capt Mangal Pandey Marg route via Kasturba Gandhi Marg, and a 1-km stretch between Sushila Naiyar Marg and Kala Patthar via Shipra Mall.Residents, however, said progress has been painfully slow. More than six months after work began, only around 200 metres of one stretch has been completed, while the remaining roads have turned into muddy, uneven corridors with the onset of rain.As showers continued through the day, several under-construction stretches looked like mud volcanoes, making movement difficult for motorists and pedestrians alike.In Gyan Khand, near the GDA market, waterlogging left the newly built bus stop resembling an island in the middle of a flooded stretch.“If not roads, at least they built a bus stop. It may not be serving its intended purpose, but it has become a safe place for commuters and residents to escape the rain and waterlogging,” a resident of the area, Sima Singh, said.
