SC says 2 years too long to decongest Delhi, calls top cop

NEW DELHI: Observing that two years’ time sought by the Delhi government to de-congest traffic in the city is too long, the Supreme Court on Friday summoned the police commissioner to personally appear before it to explain what urgent steps are needed to tackle the problem.
A task force constituted by the Delhi government had identified as many as 77 bottlenecks in the city and put them in three categories — 28 highly congested ones, 30 congested ones and 19 mildly congested corridors.But the government, in its response to the court, did not specify any time-line for removing the traffic bottlenecks and encroachments on city roads, compelling the court to summon the police commissioner.
A bench of Justices Madan B Lokur and Deepak Gupta said the people of Delhi should not be forced to live with the traffic congestion for another two years and something had to be done urgently to bring relief to them as they are already facing severe problems due to deteriorating air quality which is aggravated by traffic congestion.
It asked advocate Wasim A Qadri, representing the Delhi government, as to why it would take two years to remove the traffic bottlenecks in the city. Quadri said two years’ time has been mentioned since constructions of flyovers, underpasses and foot over-bridges would take time.
“Short-term measures, like improvements in road geometrics etc, will take six to eight months. However, long-term measures like foot over-bridges, underpasses, U-turns will take six months for approval and sanction of estimates. Thereafter, 12 months will be required to execute the approval,” the city government said.
The 77 congested corridors were identified by the six teams constituted by LG Anil Baijal. Of the 28 highly congested corridors, southern traffic range has nine, outer range seven, western and eastern ranges four each, central three and northern traffic one. Four roads — Mehrauli-Badarpur, Aurobindo Marg, Mathura Road and Chirag Dilli Road — would get top priority for de-congestion through a pilot project, the government said.
The government contended that it was taking taking steps to broaden the roads to deal with traffic congestion. But the bench was not satisfied with the response as the government failed to take steps in the last one-and-half years after the report on congestion was prepared by Delhi traffic police in February 2017.