PURI: Around 10,000 police personnel would be deployed in and around Puri for smooth conduct of the annual Rath Yatra of the Trinity on July 18.
This was decided at the second high-level coordination meeting of the Rath Yatra, which was presided over by chairman of Nabakalebara Infrastructure Development Committee Maheswar Mohanty, here on Saturday. SP Ashish Kumar Singh and Inspector General of Police RP Koche informed mediapersons that 200 close circuit cameras are being installed at all the strategic places covering the entire city and the Grand Road, the venue of the fete, to monitor crowd movement. Focus is also being laid on traffic management during the event and VVIP security.
The commercial manager of East Coast Railways, Tribikram Mishra, said the ongoing doubling of the Khurda Puri railway track from Sakhigopal to Puri has been completed and from July 1, passenger trains would ply on the new track. He added that the frequency of trains will be increased and they would ply in an interval of 15 to 30 minutes. “A total of 200 trains would run to Puri during the fete and to accommodate the additional passenger traffic, two new platforms have been constructed at Puri railway station,” he said.
Four-laning of the Bhubaneswar-Puri NH-316 has been completed and the railway over-bridge near Chandanpur would be made operational soon, informed the officials of National Highways Authority of India.
Mohanty expressed concern at the failure of various departments in completing infrastructure projects related to Rath Yatra on time. Work on construction of ancillary roads, laying of drainage pipelines, sewerage channels and drinking water pipelines are far from over.
On the occasion, District Magistrate Aravind Agarwal expressed concern over erratic power supply in the town. The PHD and PWD also came in the firing line of the committee for poor execution of work in their respective areas.
