Thiruvananthapuram The roads in Kerala are badly designed, which is why there are numerous vehicular accidents and resultant deaths in the State, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi said on Tuesday.
Mr. Gandhi said that while he was not blaming the LDF or Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan for the bad designs of the roads, the State government needs to make some rules on the design. “I have a complaint. Of course, not with you (people),” is how he raised the issue of bad road designs.
“I am not blaming the LDF or the Chief Minister, because some of these roads have been built by them and others by the UDF. But, when I walk on the roads, I find one half slopes one way and the other another way. Sometimes they are sharply curved,” Mr. Gandhi said and added that he was not saying it in a critical way, but from his experience walking on the roads and watching the ambulances.
He said lots of people are getting hurt or killed as result of the problem.
Mr. Gandhi, also the MP of Wayanad, was addressing a gathering at Kallambalam here at the end of the third day of the Kerala leg of the Congress party’s 150-day and 3,570- km long Bharat Jodo Yatra.
He said that during his march he noticed ambulances passing by every five minutes and when he enquired who were in them, he was told that they were victims of road accidents.
He said that before coming to Kerala and walking on the roads here, he had believed that people of the State drove rashly. “But, now I realise this is not true. There is something very wrong with the design of your roads,” he added.
He further said that “hidden in all these bad designs are a lot of tragedies”.
“So, I am just saying this in a constructive way,” Mr. Gandhi said.
