THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Though the city corporation has replaced nearly 50% of the street lights with energy-efficient LED lights, lack of timely maintenance is turning out to be an issue leaving the capital in the dark. Badly-lit streets, especially bylanes of residential areas, are posing a serious threat to the residents, motorists and pedestrians alike.
The residential areas in the city plunge into darkness after dusk, as the majority of the street lights have become defunct owing to lack of maintenance. According to officials, because of the pandemic outbreak, proper and timely maintenance of the street lights had not happened for the past two years.
“A majority of the street lights in our residential area have been lying defunct for the past five months. We have been taking it up with the authorities since last December but the lights are yet to be fixed. The pedestrian paths are in a dilapidated state and due to lack of proper lighting, commuters are having a hard time using the roads. It’s really dangerous after late evening. We have given a memorandum to the mayor but no action has been taken till date,” said Sashidharan Nair, president of Plamoodu-Thekkumoodu Residents’ Association.
There are around 90,000 street lights in the state capital. The civic body and Kerala State Electricity Board (KSEB) have jointly replaced around 39,000 lights with LED lights. The civic body pays around Rs 30 lakh every month as power charge to KSEB for street lights alone. According to officials, LED lights have helped the civic body cut down the electricity bill up to `20 lakh per month.
According to the residents’ associations, they are unable to take it up directly with KSEB as authorities refuse to accept complaints relating to street lights directly from residents.
“The KSEB authorities come up with excuses and turn a blind eye towards the complaint raised by the residents. When we contact them, they ask us to take it up with the ward councillor. They fix the lights only when the councillor intervenes. We are paying taxes and this is not the right way to deal with the grievances of the residents. There needs to be a proper system. We have expressed stiff protest on every platform but the issue still remains the same,” said president MS Venugopal,
Federation of Residents’ Association Thiruvananthapuram (FRAT). He said unscientifically located electric posts are also posing a threat to the residents.
The opposition parties in the council blamed the apathy from the civic authorities for the defunct LED lights. BJP councillor Karamana Ajith alleged that the civic body had been procuring LED lights from a public sector undertaking paying more price. “The PSU which was supplying the LED lights was procuring it from another company and selling it to the corporation for a higher price. We raised this issue in the recent council session which decided to go for a proper tender for maintaining street lights,” said Karamana Ajith.
Expression of interest invited
With timely maintenance of street lights becoming a serious issue, the city corporation has decided to deploy an agency for ensuring timely maintenance. Works standing committee chairman D R Anil said the civic body has already invited the expression of interest to find a suitable agency for maintaining street lights. He said the company will be responsible to do the operation and maintenance for a period of five years.
“Maintenance of the street lights is not happening properly and hence we have decided to rope in an agency which is willing to take up five years of operation and maintenance. We are trying to include a clause in the contact making it mandatory to replace defunct street lights within 48 hours,” said Anil.
A KSEB official said timely replacement of LED lights is not happening. “The company which has taken up the maintenance work makes the replacement based on the total number of defunct lights. They prefer to do it together when the count for replacement is around 50. Owing to the pandemic, routine maintenance work was not happening. We normally replace the defunct lights with new ones and later repair them to avoid delay,” said Anil, who is also the LDF parliamentary party leader. He said the new system would come into effect within two months.
In addition to this, the civic body is also planning to install solar-powered mini high-mast lamps at selected locations in the capital.
Online complaint redressal platform
With complaints mounting, the civic body is planning to set up an online platform for citizens to raise grievances relating to street lights. The civic body is also planning to set up a LED light maintenance wing. In the current budget, it has set aside Rs 2 lakh for launching an online platform and mobile application — Lightup.com — for the citizens to raise complaints relating to street lights.
An official of the IT wing under the corporation said the new system can be developed in a month. “We are yet to get the administrative and technical sanctions for the project. Information Kerala Mission (IKM), the government agency giving online services for the corporation, doesn’t have such software. Hence, we have to do it separately. Just launching the platform alone will not help and we need to sustain it,” said the official.
Energy efficient
The city corporation and KSEB have jointly replaced around 39,000 lights with LED lights. The city has around 90,000 street lights in total. The civic body pays around I30 lakh every month for street lights alone. LED lights have helped corporation cut down the electricity bill up to I20 lakh per month.