Civic chief orders for structural audits of unipoles in middle of roads

Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar:

The Smart City Office has granted permission to erect more than 100 unipoles in the city. These unipoles have been erected in the middle of roads. However, in terms of safety, the Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar Municipal Corporation (CSMC) administration will direct the private agencies to submit structural audit reports of unipoles, just as structural audits were obtained from hoarding agencies in the city.

It may be noted that 16 innocent citizens lost their lives in the tragic incident of Ghatkopar (Mumbai). Following this incident, the State Government ordered all Municipal Corporations to conduct structural and stability audits of hoardings in their respective jurisdictions. Accordingly, the CSMC gave the orders to 14 agencies responsible for 420 hoardings in the city to submit reports. These agencies have submitted their reports to the CSMC’s estate section.

When asked about this issue, the CSMC administrator G Sreekanth said that whether it's hoardings or unipoles erected on roads, or hoardings on buildings, the focus is on structural and stability audits to ensure no one gets harmed. The reports received by CSMC are currently being reviewed and further action will be taken on accordingly. Moreover, the CSMC through a tender process will appoint an expert private agency for initiating action on hoardings and mobile towers, underlined the administrator.

Dues from hoarding agencies

Hoarding agencies have not paid the rent for spaces to the municipal corporation as per the contract. The outstanding dues is of Rs 7 crore. With interest and penalties, this amount reaches around Rs 10 crore. However, the agencies avoided paying even the principal amount despite repeated notices. On this, G Sreekanth mentioned that the hoarding agencies have challenged the decision of collecting interest on the outstanding amount in court. However, after reviewing the audit report, the outstanding principal amount will be collected. Until then, no agency will be allowed to display advertisements on any hoarding.