Good Samaritans find durable cure to roads

Hyderabad: Enough is enough is what a resident of Serene County Gachibowli, Udaya Kumar Dintyala, and like-minded people felt, vexed as they are by the laxity and apathy of civic body in tending to the badly damaged roads following heavy rains in the city. He along with Ponnusundar, former president of Rotary Club of Cyberabad and a few likeminded souls, decided to take up filling of potholes in the city.

What is interesting is a pothole-ridden road can be reopened to traffic just after 15 minutes gap, says the elated group of Good Samaritans. "We are not road engineers. It's just that over time we realised that just with help of Road Bond mixture we can easily fix potholes," says Udaya. After 15 minutes of laying the mixture, a vehicle can pass through the area and the durability of such a fix is more than 3 years, they claim.

Six volunteers are involved in this mission and an amount of Rs 16,000 was collected for this initiative. With the help of hand compactor, the group fills potholes every weekend. Road Bond is a mixture of unheated mineral aggregate and emulsified bitumen. In patching potholes, quality of materials is more important than method or machine. This mixture is also eco-friendly.

A 25 kg of Road Bond mixture costs Rs 400. "For the past one month, we have been filling potholes in the western part of the city that includes Hafizpet, Telecom Nagar, Vinayak Nagar and Miyapur," says Ponnusundar. Udaya Kumar says, "Every day we see many commuters sustaining injuries due to potholes.

Also complaining the issue to the GHMC officials is a long-drawn process. Hence, we decided to fix the problem ourselves." A member of the team said that by spending Rs 400, one can easily fill five potholes.