Udupi: Former State Minister Vasant Salian Leads Protest March Demanding Urgent Repairs to NH 17
Report and Pics by Hemanath Padubidri
Daijiworld Media Network – Udupi (RD/SP)
Udupi, Sep 9: Former state minister Vasant V Salian led a protest march on national highway (NH) 17 from Padubidri to Hejamady in the district that are located five kms apart, on Wednesday September 9 morning, in order to draw the attention of both union and state governments, about the deplorable condition of the stretch of NH 17 from Mangalore to Kundapur.
The stretch of 100 kilometers of NH 17, from Mangalore to Kundapur is in so bad a shape that motoring on this road has become a nightmare to drivers of passenger buses, heavy vehicles, light vehicles as well as two wheeler riders. NH authorities used to attend the upkeep of highways as and when the pot-holes appeared on the road every year. But, the department has not attended to the maintenance works, under the guise of the plans to widen the stretch into four-lane road. However, the formalities of widening the road is progressing at a snail’s pace and will take some more years to materialize. The stretch of the highway here has been a witness to several ghastly accidents, resulting in the death of innocent victims, because of the mistake of the highway authorities.
The traffic on NH 17 between Padubidri to Hejamady was stalled for almost 20 minutes, due to the protest march led by former state minister Vasant V Salian. Meanwhile, the traffic policemen regulated the traffic till the protest march concluded.
A memorandum was presented to the tahsildar Prasanna, for being delivered to both the state and union governments, urging them to direct the ministry of road transport, to undertake urgent repairs to NH 17 and save the daily commuters and road users from further hardships. The copies of the same were also sent to union minister of law Veerappa Moily and Rajya Sabha member Oscar Fernandes.
Taluk panchayat member Parvati G Bangera, Padubidri Billava Sangh president Sudhir Kumar, Hejamady gram panchayat president Subash Salian, Palimar gram panchayat president Karunakar Shetty, Sri Rama Sene district convener Rajesh Yermal and others took part in the march.