Gaya: The decade-long standoff between the road construction department and the electric supply company on the issue of relocation of electric poles to widen roads, including Swarajpuri Road, North Church Road, West Church Road and Karimganj Road has queered the pitch for smooth traffic in Gaya town.

The road construction department had moved ahead with the execution of the road-widening project without ensuring the relocation of electric poles making roads more accident-prone.

In the absence of relocation of poles, about Rs 10 crore spent on road widening has gone down the drain, said Lalji Prasad, a former member of the standing committee of the Gaya Municipal Corporation.

On the point of widening roads without getting the electric poles relocated, Rai Madan Kishor, former municipal commissioner (chief executive officer of the municipal body), said apparent lack of coordination between different agencies has resulted in the lop-sided execution of the widening project.

The former municipal commissioner recalled that the issue of relocation of the electric poles to facilitate road widening and smoothen the traffic system had come up for discussion in the review meetings.

The electricity board submitted an estimate on the cost of relocating the electric poles. The road construction department found the estimate to be highly inflated and as such the issue could not be resolved.

To add to the woes of residents, Bihar State Electricity Board, the original stakeholder at the time of road widening has ceased to exist.

It was split and renamed South Bihar Power Distribution Company Ltd. The company subsequently outsourced the job to India Power, a private company, adding to the complexities and passing the buck easier, said RTI activist Brijnandan Pathak.

Yuva Prayas, an organisation working in the field of road safety, also raised the issue several times. Serious and even fatal accidents have occurred at different points on the widened roads due to non-relocation of the electric poles.

Activist groups have also demanded underground laying of electric cables to dispense with the need of poles thereby ensuring automatic widening of the motorable area of the roads. But the electric supply company found the cost of underground laying of electric cables to be too high, said sources.

A suggestion to limit underground cable work to the more busy parts of the town too, has gone unheeded. Underground electric cables, besides making the roads wide, would ensure improvement in the quality of power too, said activist Motibhai.