Excelsior Correspondent
KISHTWAR, June 11: Chatroo police has registered a criminal case against the management of Bharti Airtel and Reliance Jio Telecom companies for mercilessly destroying 62 kilometers of National Highway 244 from Chatroo to Sinthan Top.
According to Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP) Abrar Chowdhary, Police Station Chatroo received a written complaint from National Highway and Infrastructure Development Corporation Limited (NHIDCL) that the Reliance Jio and Bharti Airtel have started the unauthorized digging of the NH-244 road from Chatroo to Sinthan Top for laying of the optical fiber. It has been stated in the complaint that due to the unauthorized merciless digging of the road by these companies with heavy machinery loss of crores of rupees has occurred to the road. The road surface, road shoulders and the side drains have got badly damaged. As per the assessment made by the NHIDCL, the telecom companies have caused loss of crores of rupees to the road, he added.
Taking cognizance of the matter, a case under FIR Number 22/18 under Sections 431, 336 and 427 RPC read with Section 3 of Prevention of Damages to Public Property Act was registered at Police Station Chatroo.
The SSP informed that during the course of investigation, police found that the damages are actually caused to the road is alleged in the complaint, adding that so far 6 persons have been arrested and various heavy machinery including JCBs used for damaging the road have been seized.
He said that the management of these companies without any permission and in sheer violation of guidelines has destroyed the NH-244 road in such a way that it appears as a water canal instead of road, adding that at many places the people are using the parts of this damaged road for water channelization.
“The whole drainage system of the road has got collapsed by the illegal activities of these companies by using the heavy machinery including full size JCBs”, he informed.
“Police may arrest the officers at the top level management of the companies under whose order the road has been damaged”, he said, adding that hunt has been launched to arrest the contractors to whom the works were allotted unauthorisedly which resulted into complete damage to the road.
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