Yogi Adityanath (File Photo)

BAREILLY: The Public Works Department (PWD) will soon be erecting saffron-coloured boards, displaying the slogan ‘sarkar ka sankalp, sadkon ka ho kayakalp’ (the government’s pledge is to transform roads), along with pictures of Prime Minister Narendra Modi , chief minister Yogi Adityanath and deputy CM Keshav Prasad Maurya , on the roads in UP, that have been declared pothole-free by the department. Officials at PWD told TOI that the department is busy making a total of 2.6 lakh kilometres of roads under PWD pothole-free.

Deputy chief minister Keshav Prasad Maurya on Tuesday told TOI that BJP government inherited 1.21 lakh km of potholed roads across UP from the Akhilesh Yadav government. The state has more than 3 lakh km roads. Maurya said, “We have repaired most of the stretches. The work of repairing roads is a continuous process and we have adopted new techniques in which the age of a road will be increased from five to 25 years.”

Maurya said that after constructing new roads or undergoing special repair work at any road, the Public Works Department (PWD) will be erecting unipoles. “The unipoles which will come up on the roadsides will inform the public about the places that the road connects. The unipoles will also bear information about the assembly and Lok Sabha constituencies,” added the deputy CM.

Speaking with TOI, PWD’s Bareilly division chief engineer AK Mishra said, “We will soon be erecting saffron-coloured boards along with pictures of PM Modi, CM Yogi Adityanath and deputy CM Maurya on the roads in UP that have been declared pothole-free by the department. These will be different types of boards (big and small) while cantilevers (attached only at one end) will also be erected at a few stretches.”

Mishra added, “One board will be erected per road. The cost of erecting a small board is estimated at around Rs 15,000 while the big cantilevers are estimated to cost around Rs 3.16 lakh each in Bareilly division. The installation cost of boards may vary from district to district depending upon the number of stretches to be marked.”

According to information from PWD Bareilly division, as many as 135 roads in the outskirts of the district have been identified by the department where 135 boards will be erected while 41 cantilevers will be erected on 39 roads.

GS Verma, executive engineer, PWD Bareilly, said, “For Bareilly district, a sum of Rs 20.25 lakh has already been sanctioned by the state government for the installation of small boards, whereas the amount for erecting 41 cantilever boards for the district is yet to be sanctioned.”