Repairs at Lajpat Rai Road likely to take another week

NEW DELHI: Repair work on a carriageway of Lala Lajpat Rai Road that takes traffic from Moolchand towards the New Delhi area is likely to take another week, senior officials said on Monday, even as the crucial south Delhi stretch has been shut since a collapse on an adjacent plot on Thursday, forcing commuters to take detours that add significantly to their travel time.

A double basement being built by the Central Public Works Department (CPWD) in the under-construction Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) building adjacent to Lala Lajpat Rai Road collapsed on Thursday evening, which led to a cave-in on the stretch opposite the Lodhi Road crematorium, said officials of the state PWD. Officials said the repairs on the road began on Monday.

However, while officials of the state PWD said repairs were being carried out by the central agency, a senior Central Public Works Department official denied this.

“Central Public Works Department started the repair work inside the building when the incident took place. They started the work on the road on Monday and the work will get completed in a week’s time,” said a state PWD official.

To be sure, Lala Lajpat Rai Road is under the jurisdiction of the state PWD, but officials of the agency said that since the cave-in was caused on Central Public Works Department construction site, repairs on the arterial stretch will also be carried out by the central agency itself.

However, for commuters, the collapse and subsequent closure has meant taking a detour through Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium Marg, and then either taking a right on to Dyal Singh College Road, or a left onto Bhishma Pitamah Marg. This alternative route has added significantly to travel times for people heading from south Delhi areas such as Lajpat Nagar, Jangpura and Defence Colony.

Rahul Singh, a commuter complained about the lack of traffic police deployment on the stretch.

“While the road has been blocked on one side at Lala Lajpat Rai Road and traffic lights are not working yet, no traffic police personnel have been deployed to manage the situation. People are forced to spend a lot of time stuck in traffic,” he said.

Sunil Das, a 34-year-old resident of south Delhi’s Chittaranjan Park who drives to work in New Delhi, said the road closure had set back his travel by around half an hour every day, because he had to take a detour through South Extension to avoid the bottlenecks around the JLN Stadium.

“I used to leave home around 10.45am and got to work by 11.20am. Thanks to the stretch being shut, I reach around noon nowadays when the jams are severe,” he said.

After the cave-in, the Delhi traffic police issued an advisory, asking commuters to use alternative roads such as Bhishma Pitamah Marg till repair work is complete.