Stretch of Basai Road in Gurugram caves in after sewer line burst, leads to snarls

A 2km long snarl was reported on Tuesday morning on Basai Road after a portion of the road caved in near Khandsa Chowk on Monday, after the main sewer line beneath it broke, said officials.

The locals said they noticed the cave-in on Monday night and reported the matter to the civic agencies and the administration following which a team visited the spot on Tuesday

The Basai Road connects to sectors near the Dwarka Expressway, the Kundli- Manesar-Palwal Expressway, and Jhajjar. The police diverted vehicles to the intact carriageway but that still did not help matters and congestion was reported on Tuesday morning and evening, officials said.

An official of the Municipal Corporation of Gurugram (MCG), which is responsible for fixing sewage lines, said the road caved in due to a leak in the sewage pipeline, running about 20 feet below the ground, and added that the pipeline that burst was at least 20 years old and was four feet in diameter.

The traffic police barricaded off the damaged portion of the road so that the civic agency could carry out repair works on Tuesday. A team of three police personnel was deployed there to ensure no mishap took place.

Officials of the traffic police, MCG and Gurugram Metropolitan Development Authority (GMDA) reached the spot around 9 am Tuesday to assess the situation after which the temporary repair work started.

Commuters travelling to Jhajjar were the worst hit as it took more than 20 minutes to cross the 15m stretch, traffic police said.

Manu Mishra, a resident of Sector 10, said the stretch is one of the most unsafe ones in the area as the road caves in frequently and needs to be re-carpeted. “The civic agencies had earlier also repaired the sewage lines after a portion of the road caved in. The pipeline gets damaged every other month which in turn weakens the road,” he said.

Vicky Kumar, a shopkeeper on Basai Road, said Monday was the fourth time in the past one year that the road has caved in. “The condition of the road is deteriorating and driving on the stretch has become riskier. There was a similar issue 15 days ago when a bicyclist fell into a deep pit that developed on the stretch. After we reported it to the authorities, they took a week to repair it,” he said.

The sewage pipeline was laid during the Yamuna Action Plan in 2004-05 and GMDA is the road owning agency, said officials.

Devender Kumar, another shopkeeper from the area, said they have filled potholes on the stretch to make it motorable but the problems are never ending. “We are losing out on business due to the bad road as people often take alternative routes to bypass the stretch altogether,” he said.

Officials said it will take at least a few days to repair the road as the sewer pipeline has to be replaced first.

Amit Godara, executive engineer of Infrastructure 1, GMDA, said they had sent a team to carry out temporary repair works so that vehicular movement could be restored. “We have resolved the issue for the moment and have asked the MCG to look into the issue and check the leakage so that the problem does not recur,” he said.