Lachungpas losing patience with BRO and BSNL indifference

GANGTOK, 30 Sept: The patience of the people of Lachung is wearing thin in the face of the repeated collapse of infrastructure under the charge of Border Roads Organisation and BSNL. Connectivity, both, road and telecom, is seriously challenged in this North district village and the people, even after making relaxations for extreme weather conditions, are convinced that their privation is made more severe because of “ignorance and negligence” of the two agencies.
Pema Lachungpa, a Lachung Dzumsa coordinator, while addressing a press conference here last Friday, said, “By taking lesson from last year’s earthquake devastation, these two organizations should have made some special strategies and should have been better prepared for the monsoon to keep the area connected, but no such strategy was made.” The photographs [alongside] of the roads from Lachung to Chungthang that he shared with the media illustrate the condition of road infrastructure there.
As a result, Lachung has been cut off, both by road and for telecommunication, for the past more than two months ever since a massive landslide tore away the road at Khedum, a few kilometers out of Lachung towards Chungthang. While this stretch, despite attendant dangers, offered the option of transshipment, the rash of landslides triggered by the heavy showers which began on 21 September have littered the Lachug-Chungthang road with more than 30 landslides, at least a dozen of which are major.
Transshipments are no longer an option, and people are required to walk the entire distance to Chungthang now and even the roads beyond it are not open for regular traffic.
As things stand, Lachung has been without roads, electricity or telephone for the last two months and the terrain and weather notwithstanding, the people remain convinced that BRO and BSNL could have delivered better had they not decided to “ignore” the situation, Mr. Lachungpa adds.
To explain his contention in more detail, he pointed out that BRO has not maintained enough manpower, equipment or even fuel for its machines on this axis to ensure quick repairs and timely restoration.
To illustrate this point in starker detail, he pointed out that the back-cutting works for road widening works on North Sikkim Highway [from Phengla above Gangtok onwards] has been underway for the past 20 years and the organization has covered barely 20 kms.
He underlined that the people from his area need to travel to Mangan or Gangtok for medical emergencies and that the disruption of the road has posed severe problems.
Speaking on the communication situation, he informed that Lachung has telephone services for barely a month in a year. In this regard, he mentioned that the people have approached BSNL authorities several times to demand better services but seen no action in this regard so far.
Given the challenges of the terrain, the people remain convinced that fibre-optic cables can be maintained properly and have demanded that the area be serviced by satellite link instead which would make the service “landslide proof”. This suggestion was reportedly turned down by BSNL on the grounds that it would take around Rs 1 crore to install such a system, an investment which BSNL appears uninterested to make. He rued the situation, adding that despite several directions from the state government, these organizations have not been taking the problems of their area seriously.
“If this situation continues, then the people of North Sikkim will hold a meeting to discuss these problems and take some strong action… now, the people will remain silent,” he said.