The Hindu : Digging puts residents in grave difficulty

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, Jun 01, 2002

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Digging puts residents in grave difficulty

By Sandeep Joshi

NEW DELHI MAY 31. ``Blatant disregard of security, safety, engineering and environmental norms'' by a private telecom company providing fixed line telephone service in the Capital while laying its cables in their colony has caused undue hardships to residents of Vasant Enclave in South Delhi.

According to the Vasant Enclave Welfare Association, the 424 flat owners of this South Delhi's self-finance housing scheme are a dejected lot as the colony has suffered greatly due to unprofessional digging and trenching by Touchtel, a division of Bharti Telenet Limited.

``Since Touchtel workers started laying underground cables earlier this year, they have been creating problems for us. First of all, they started digging the roads without even informing us. It was a major security breach as we did not know the difference between workers and intruders,'' rued the Association president, R. Kumar.

A concerned Mr. Kumar approached Touchtel authorities to know what their plans were. "Initially they declined to cooperate with us. But after pressure from various quarters, they told us they had valid permission from the Municipal Corporation of Delhi for road-cutting. And after that they started digging and trenching work at every nook and corner of the colony,'' he said.

Interestingly, Mr. Kumar pointed out that the permission letter issued by the MCD had names of various colonies including Anand Niketan, Shanti Niketan, West End, Vasant Lok and Vasant Market but did not mention the name of Vasant Enclave. "When we made enquiries, Touchtel officials asserted that they had obtained permission for road-cutting in the Vasant Vihar area,'' he said, adding there was something fishy in the entire episode.

However, while laying these cables workers allegedly damaged roads and storm water drains extensively besides carrying out reckless digging near roots of full grown trees. "No norms are being followed while digging. The Delhi Government's directives ban digging in the root zone of trees but in our colony around half a dozen cases of this nature can be seen,'' alleged the Association president.

But the residents' worst fears came true after a month of cable laying work when during the last week's rains, roads developed deep potholes at nearly 15 spots where digging causing serious parking problems. "I had parked my car on the road where digging had taken place. After overnight rain when I came out next morning my car was lying in knee deep water as the earth beneath it had caved in,'' said Charanjit Singh, a resident, who claimed that a few other incidents of car damage has also happened in the colony.

Suggesting that Touchtel officials should have planned digging operations only after consulting them, Mr. Kumar said the residents of the colony were well aware about the topography of the area and therefore their suggestions would have come handy for the company besides saving residents from such grave difficulties.

The residents are also dejected over the lackadaisical approach of various government authorities to whom they approached for help. "We lodged complaints with the MCD and Forest authorities but no one responded to our plea leaving us in lurch,'' added Mr. Kumar.

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