ROURKELA: Braving rains, villagers of Bisra block in Sundargarh district on Thursday staged a road blockade at Jareikela protesting the delay in widening of National Highway-320D.
Inconvenienced with the slow pace of the NH expansion project, the protesters demanded expeditious completion of the road work between Jareikela and Bondamunda. BJD MLA of Birmitrapur Rohit Joseph Tirkey joined the villagers in their protest.
Bisra panchayat samiti member Somnath Raha said land acquisition for the NH-320D expansion project was initiated from Jareikela side and the old bituminous road surface was removed two years ago. The unpaved surface was partly covered with fly ash and Wet Mix Macadem (WMM) surface.
Raha alleged that the road work has not yet started from Jareikela side and due to slow project work, people of the region have been facing difficulties in commuting on a daily basis. Besides, incessant dust pollution is heaping additional miseries on the local residents, he claimed.
The blockade, which was staged from morning to evening, was lifted after acting superintending engineer (SE) of the National Highway Division (NHD) Amit Tude assured the agitators of addressing their grievances.
The SE assured continuous curing of the WWM surface, removal of the fly ash and to keep the road worthy of traffic movement. He said work for laying of bituminous tarmac (BT) from Jareikela would start from November 7 and the progress would be monitored continuously.
The first phase work for a stretch of around 22 km from Jareikela to Bondamunda had started on October 14, 2024 at a cost of around `132 crore. The SE said BT road work of about 11 km has been completed from Bondamunda side. Utility shifting work is going on in the remaining portions and the contract firm has been given time extension for project completion by June 2027, he added. Earlier, the project completion target was October 13, 2026.
Meanwhile, the NHD is simultaneously working on finalising the bypass alignment of 19.470 km of the NH-320D through Kaparanda in Bisra to Suidihi in Lathikata block. The bypass would meet NH-143 at Suidihi.
The NH-320D runs through Sundargarh district with a length of about 36 km from Jareikela to the NH-143 junction at Hockey square in Rourkela.
