List steps for road safety, Hyderabad High Court tells Centre, Telangana governments

Hyderabad: The Hyderabad High Court on Tuesday directed the Centre and Telangana state governments to file affidavits explaining the steps taken to mandating the contractors to maintain adequate safety standards as mandated by the Ministry of road transport and Highways and as well as those given in Indian Road Congress Codes without any deviation.

A division bench comprising Acting Chief Justice Ramesh Ranganathan and Justice J. Uma Devi was dealing with a suo motu taken up based on a letter by Mr V. B. Rama Rao, a resident of Ameerpet in city.

He urged the court to intervene into the matter before more people die on roads due to non-maintenance of safety standards by the contractors while constructing the highways.

He urged the court to direct the state and the central government to make the contractors responsible in maintaining the safety standards and also to ensure public liability insurance as mandatory for all civil construction works even for the road works.

While issuing notices to the respondent authorities, the High Court bench posted the case to July 17.