Chennai: The Madras high court on Tuesday directed the Indian Roads Congress to nominate a team of experts to carry out the inspection of roads in National Highway-4 from Chennai to Vellore and submit a report to the court.
A division bench, comprising Chief Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul and Justice M. Sathyanarayanan, gave the directive on a petition filed by V.R.S. Sampath, a journalist, and posted the matter to October 7. When the quality of the roads in this section was questioned, the National Highways Authority of India disputed it. The bench said, “We would like to have an independent agency report in this behalf.”
In his petition, Sampath submitted that those using NH-4 were paying tolls of Rs 40 to Rs 50 for every 50 km ostensibly for using the express highways’ ‘A’ class facilities. The existing highway was being upgraded as a national express highway for which toll was being collected in 10 different places for the past seven years.
The NHAI was constructing bridges and carrying out repair works in 45 places on NH-4, leaving the road uneven. Vehicular movement had thus been affected, they got damaged, accidents occurred, there were delays and increase in travel time.
The NHAI was collecting toll for providing clean and quality roads for road-users. Therefore, he sent a representation to the authorities to stop collecting toll till the construction of the bridges and other repair works had been completed. But there had been no response, he added.
