The Bombay high court on Tuesday asked the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) whether, while giving out road construction contracts, the BMC must get an undertaking from the contractors that pot
The Bombay high court on Tuesday asked the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) whether, while giving out road construction contracts, the BMC must get an undertaking from the contractors that potholes will not occur on the roads in the future. The HC also warned the BMC that if it did not enforce such an undertaking on the contractors, the court would direct the corporation to do so.
A division bench of Justice V.M. Kanade and Justice M.S. Sonak was hearing a public interest litigation (PIL) filed by advocate and Mumbai BJP secretary Vivekanand Gupta. Mr Gupta has filed the petition claiming that there is a nexus between civic officials and contractors.
The petition said there were incidents of water-logging in the city on July 19 and 20. It added that after heavy rains last year, the BMC had ordered an inquiry into de-silting contract work. According to the petitioner, the probe brought out an “unholy nexus” between the contractors and civic officials. Subsequently, the civic commissioner had ordered that an FIR be filed against the contractors involved in the de-silting scam, also known as the ‘nalla safai scam’.
In another development, this time in the case of a road contracts scam, the municipal commissioner had ordered a probe after receiving complaints from a BJP MP and the Mumbai mayor. The probe pertained to the construction of roads during the 2013-14 and 2015-16 periods, and interim inquiries showed serious irregularities in the roadwork. The municipal chief had ordered that an FIR be registered in that matter as well, the petition said.
