Cover manholes

The city is being transformed into a well developed place under the much-hyped Smart City project, but one fails to understand why the common masses are being pushed to the wall by keeping the manholes open at most of the places. In the past nearly one year, work under the smart city has been executed in the commercial hub Lal Chowk by Srinagar Smart City Limited (SSCL). It has been witnessed that the entire stretch from Residency Road to Ghanta Ghar is dotted with such newly constructed manholes, causing inconvenience to pedestrians. Besides, causing hardships to the commuters and pedestrians, such uncovered manholes have resulted in unfortunate incidents as well and a photojournalist is one of the open examples of such an incident, who has lost his eyesight after falling in the manhole while covering an event. It seems that the administration is either not bothered or negligent over the uncovered manholes in the commercial hub Lal Chowk as nothing has been done in this regard, despite remaining the long demand of the traders as well as the other local people from the area. One could imagine the seriousness of the administration in preventing the unfortunate accidents at the spots as the manholes have not been covered in the locality yet. The development is always an appreciative step, but no room should be given for any misfortune incident, therefore, all the manholes need to be covered at an earliest by the concerned authorities so that the people can walk and commute freely on the roads.