Traffic jam on Indore-Dewas highway: MP HC issues notices to Centre, NHAI

Indore, Jun 30 (PTI) The Madhya Pradesh High Court on Monday sought response from the Union government and National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) on a PIL filed on the massive traffic jam on Indore-Dewas section of Agra-Mumbai National Highway recently.

Justices Vivek Rusia and Binod Kumar Dwivedi of the HC's Indore bench issued notice to the Centre and NHAI as well as administration and police of Indore on the petition of Dewas lawyer Anand Adhikari. The division bench directed the respondents to reply to the notice within a week.

The High Court also directed that a private company constructing a road between Indore and Dewas on the National Highway be included in the list of respondents.

The interim arrangement of diversion of route for heavy vehicles on the Indore-Dewas section of the highway should be continued for the time being, the HC said.

"There was a massive jam between Indore and Dewas for about 50 hours between Wednesday and Friday last week in which thousands of vehicles were stranded and the public faced great inconvenience," the petitioner's lawyer Girish Patwardhan told PTI.

In view of these circumstances, a plea has been made in the PIL that the road construction work on the very busy Indore-Dewas section should be done under the supervision of the High Court so that accountability of the respondents can be fixed, he added.

Incidentally, Vijay Panchal, a resident of Bijalpur area of Indore, had claimed his father Kamal Panchal (65) died of a heart attack when his car was stuck in the massive jam. PTI HWP MAS BNM