Vice-President Mohammad Hamid Ansari's visit to Patna on Friday came as a boon for its central parts.

A sudden hasty repair of dug-up roads and spraying of bleaching powder near puddles on the route followed by Ansari's cavalcade preceded the VIP visit.

For instance, roads dug up at the intersection in front of the radio station on Fraser Road for a drainage project were causing inconvenience to motorists for the past few weeks; they were filled up on Thursday night with patchwork, leaving no sign of any groundwork that used to frequently stall traffic.

Similarly, sand and soil was spread on the waterlogged stretches on either side of Fraser Road in front of Bharatiya Nritya Kala Mandir. Most roads that the Vice-President's cavalcade passed through looked spick-and-span with no sign of garbage anywhere. Vice-President Ansari was in Patna to chair the inaugural session of the four-day international conference on social statistics in India, organised by the Asian Development Research Institute.

Though the civic authorities "sanitised" the routes ahead of the VIP visit, numerous other places in the city were left crying for attention.

Roads dug up near Patna Museum for the same drainage project are unattended even after the official onset of monsoon. The drainage project connecting the sump house at SP Verma Road with Mandiri Nullah is, in fact, delayed; it had a March deadline for completion. Bihar Urban Infrastructure Development Corporation (BUIDCo) started work in March 2015 on the Rs 9.96 crore drainage project to solve central Patna's waterlogging problem. Residents have been facing similar snarls on Station Road, particularly at the Patna Junction roundabout, as it has been dug up for flyover construction work and remains waterlogged and chock-a-block with traffic almost throughout the day.

Lack of alternate traffic arrangement and unregulated parking by autorickshaws at the Junction roundabout has compounded the situation. The civic authorities drew criticism from residents for turning a blind eye to day-to-day civic issues though they were quick in presenting an "all-is-well" picture to the Vice-President. "Though we live in a democratic country, it takes a VIP visit to address civic issues. Lack of awareness among residents about their rights is also a reason for the civic menace," said city-based physiotherapist and social activist Ratnesh Chaudhary.

Officialspeak

"The repair and patchwork on Fraser Road was not done specifically for the arrival of the Vice-President," said Abhishek Singh, who took charge as the new chief of the Patna Municipal Corporation on Thursday.

"In a meeting held under the chairmanship of principal urban development and housing secretary on Thursday, BUIDCo agreed to complete all works on SP Verma-Mandiri Nullah drainage project within a week."