The Government authorities have been undertaking or planning some task or the other for some years now to resolve problems of landslides, rockfalls and landslips which block the State’s roads including the Char Dham Yatra circuit at various sites every year during the monsoon season.
The lambagad slide zone has continued to cause problems for about 17 years now. The highway often gets blocked by debris at this slide zone during the rains. The Government authorities concerned halt traffic and clear the debris in immediate response to the situation apart from which varied measures have been undertaken or planned for achieving a long-term solution to this problem.
However, the authorities have so far not been able to execute any measures effectively for ensuring the proper treatment of this slide zone. The Border Roads Organisation (BRO) and the Public Works Department had been accorded the responsibility of treatment of this slide zone but the situation is yet to improve.
As part of these measures, the PWD had facilitated the visit of slide zone experts from abroad to lambagad in the previous year but little concrete improvement has been achieved so far. The residents of the region have also remained dissatisfied with the Government stance regarding major issues like the lambagad slide zone. Sources state that tunneling and other works proposed for resolving problem at such vulnerable sites on the mountain road circuit may not achieve the desired improvement and secure road infrastructure because factors like indiscriminate and excessive use of explosives detonated for road construction have caused considerable damage and made such areas geologically weaker and prone to recurring deterioration.
In many cases, stretches of the road have been constructed through areas which the scientists stated were not ideal for road construction and vulnerable to natural disasters. The temporary and at times, unscientifically executed repair and construction works on the roads have for some years been eliciting criticism and concern from geologists and scientists of various institutions including the Wadia Institute of Himalayan Geology, Uttarakhand Space Application Centre and the Uttarakhand Environment Protection and Pollution Control Board but successive State governments have apparently remained apathetic towards such concerns.
It remains to be seen whether the State authorities will be able to achieve the desired improvement in the road infrastructure in the near future or end up perpetuating the cycle of destruction and reconstruction which has been going on for years now.