Heavy vehicles continue to encroach upon the service lanes of Tata-Kandra road - a mishap-prone, four-lane artery that links steel city Jamshedpur with Adityapur industrial area - leaving little room for two-wheelers and pedestrians.

Trucks and trailers have turned the service lanes into a parking bay, and bikers, cyclists and pedestrians - for whose safety the service lanes were built - are forced to use the main carriageway, increasing manifold the risk of fatal accidents.

Statistics claim over 300 deaths and several cases of permanently disability in mishaps on Tata-Kandra Road ever since it was reconstructed and widened in 2012.

Subdivisional police officer (SDPO), Seraikela, K.V. Raman said they had, in December last year, lodged an FIR with Gamharia police station against trucks found parked on the service lanes.

"The management of a private thermal power company approached us and said the trucks seen on the service lanes had only come to unload coal and owing to some snag, had remained stuck for a longer period. So, we did not pursue the FIR, but later we came to know that parking of heavy vehicles is regular in Adityapur and Gamharia," Raman told The Telegraph.

Terming it a perennial problem, the SDPO said they would soon carry out an inspection and initiate steps for prosecuting the trucks. "This time, we will not listen to baseless pleas from any company."

Another pressing gripe is that half of the 15km road remains in the dark with no streetlights installed. As a result, commuters find it difficult to negotiate the artery after sundown.

"I pray to god that I reach home safe," said Ved Prakash Sinha, a resident of Adityapur who works in an industrial unit in Gamharia.