Mumbai's Parsis have appealed to Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis to use his authority to o improve road conditions on the NH48 linking the city to north India, and the only road route to their holiest shrine, the Iranshah at Udvada in Gujarat.
Last week, the Bombay Parsi Punchayet, the community's main trust in Mumbai, wrote to Nitin Gadkari, Union minister for transport and highways, drawing his attention to the 'death trap' that the road is. Industrialist Cyrus Mistry lost his life in an accident on the road in 2022.
Dr Boorjis Doctor, a member of the Parsi community, who has been rallying like-minded activists to draw the government's attention to the condition of the highway, wrote to Fadnavis on September 15. Doctor said that he wanted to draw attention to the Dahisar-Talasari section that has become a ' killer road' because of the non-implementation of Indian Roads Congress (IRC) rules. He said there seemed to be no will to enforce IRC norms by enforcement personnel during repairs and construction. IRC is the national consultative body for setting standards and designs for roads.
The Parsi media has lent its support to the campaign to make the highway safer. Jam-e-Jamshed, a prominent voice in the community, commented in a recent editorial that it remains to be seen how soon the authorities step in and bring some semblance of sanity to the 'hellish highway' that is an ongoing nightmare for motorists. Minister Nitin Gadkari is known to be extremely efficient and effective, and it is hoped that he hears the pleas of Parsi pilgrims and initiates corrective action, the newspaper added.
Parsi pilgrims driving to Udvada said the road is treacherous and takes an excruciatingly long time, usually more than five hours, to travel the 195-odd kms to the town on the Gujarat border. Many Parsis are avoiding trips to Udwada due to the bad condition of the road. Apart from the unregulated heavy vehicular traffic, the poor construction of the white-topping work on the road, and incessant repairs add to the problem.
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