Nashik: Nashik city has developed rapidly in the last few years. New industries came to Nashik, and big progress was also made in the hospitality and health sectors. But as the city develops, on the other hand, encroachment has also increased at the same pace.
Some parts of Nashik, including old Nashik, Satpur, Panchavati and other areas are considered to be dense populated, there are many experiences that if there occurs any mishap or accident due to lack of road development, administration has to face big problem in relief work.
The government needs to pay attention to this while celebrating Road Safety Week. The Mumbai-Pune-Nashik golden triangle has been making rapid progress in the last few years. Due to this, Nashik is getting preference after Mumbai-Pune.
In the last ten to fifteen years, thousands of new buildings have been constructed, new settlements have been established, but the old premises have remained the same.
They are still deprived of development and there are no proper road infrastructure to get access there. During the last Simhastha Kumbh Mela, crores of rupees were spent to build a ring road in the city, while the government also built a subway and a grand flyover at Dwarka. Billions of rupees have been spent in other areas but the development work in the old areas of the city has still remained neglected.
Roads are not as good as they should be, especially in slums and middle class settlements. This can be a major obstacle to relief efforts in the event of an accident. Last year, a huge fire was broke out in the early hours of the morning in the adjacent Ghas Bazar slum area of Bhadrakali police station, but the place was badly damaged as there was no way for the fire tenders to reach the place.
Many such incidents hint at a dire need for roads and officials and people’s representatives at the same time also assure the people on this but the condition of the roads remains the same. Encroached roads in Old Nashik area like Nanavali, Bagwanpura, Kathada, Dwarka slum, Ganjamal, Bharat Nagar, Shivaji Wadi, Shivaji Chowk, Motha Rajwada and many other areas have not been cleared yet. Roads have become very narrow due to large scale encroachment even in the areas where roads were developed in the past.
People park their vehicles directly on the road as there is no space to park them. This requires a great deal of exercise for pedestrians. While the municipal corporation has to have a road of at least nine meters while approving the new interim development plan, some new colonies as well as major roads are being constructed accordingly.
In places where new buildings have stood along the six meters or seven and a half meters roadside, residents have made encroachments on the ground floor adjacent to roads. The Municipal Corporation also needs to investigate and take action against such people.
Need a curb on offenders
The encroachment at many important squares in the city, kiosks on the roads has increased. There are rumours that some goondas are also behind this. The encroachment of handcarts and taparis, kiosks has increased in various important intersections as it is understood that one needs to have ‘blessings’ of such law offenders while installing handcarts or taparis. Even when the corporation has made separate hawkers’ zone, it does not seem to be being complied with.
