Approach roads to Golden Temple lie unused

Neeraj Bagga

Tribune News Service

Amritsar, August 19

While the main road leading to the Golden Temple starting from Hall Gate witnesses a huge rush of traffic other approach roads to the holy shrine passing through Ghee Mandi and Shera Wala Gate are lying unutilised.

A shopkeeper, Niranjan Singh, said: “It was a wastage of resources and failure of planning on the part of the administration.”

He said the government and its agencies conceptualised schemes, invested crores of rupees on roads but fail to make these properly utilised.

Citing the instance of road widening from the Ghee Mandi chowk to Bazar Sandukan, he said despite a lot of efforts was made by the authorities, the road was lying unutilised.

Though the state government laid the road after investing a huge sum in acquiring the land for the same, it failed to divert either visiting devotees and VVIPs to the road.

The road, which wears a virtually deserted look now, can be used to facilitate VIP movement to the shrine as commuters taking the main road face inconvenience during visits of VIPs. Besides, it is also the shortest way to reach GT Road either from the Baba Phula Singh Burj and Ram Talai road.

The road came up after over 100 shops and houses were demolished to widen the road to the Golden Temple and Jallianwala Bagh via Ghee Mandi and Bazar Sanduka.

In 1998, the administration had conceptualised the Jallianwala Bagh road-widening scheme. As per the scheme, the 1.5 km-road stretch close to the Jallianwala Bagh till Ghee Mandi was widened up to 40 ft to ease congestion.

The government had to foot compensation to the tune of Rs 8.98 crore for around 105 affected property owners on the stretch. The HC also took notice of old buildings that were in a deplorable condition on both sides of the route.

The road from the Hall Gate to the Sikh shrine is the most popular among tourists. Ample wide lane and footpaths on the either side have made it a favourite market for shopkeepers and shoppers alike. However, parking by shopkeepers, their employees, shoppers and visitors add to the traffic chaos.

Rampant encroachments by the shopkeepers and plying of rehrees are major traffic obstacles. Besides, movement of VIPs and VVIPs also inconveniences commuters.

Another shopkeeper, Hardeep Singh, said popular roads like Hall Gate, Ram Bagh and Ramsar leading to the shrine were replete with retail shops of various articles. Hence, the flow of tourists could not be diverted to the Ghee Mandi road which lacks shops.

He said the VVIP movement could easily be diverted to the Ghee Mandi road which had a width of 40 ft and even more at some points.

However, Deputy Commissioner Ravi Bhagat said it was a good demand made by residents and the administration would think over it.

He said a word of suggestion would be sent across for considering it before making the route plan.