I had a harrowing experience on January 10 that I want to share with residents so they can be careful and with the authorities so they can take action and save lives before it’s too late.

I was crossing the street between DD and CD Blocks, outside Bidhannagar Subdivisional Hospital and, as is the protocol, I looked to the right and left. When the road seemed clear stepped ahead but alas! I had not looked down, where the road was full of cables.

My right leg got entangled in the cables and I took a fall. Before I could realise what happened, a car whizzed past my ear, barely a foot away. Two other cars had been racing on this stretch and, seeing me down, one of them screeched to a halt 5ft from my head. My spectacles had fallen a distance from me.

Passersby helped me up and took me to Nandan, the medicine shop there but seeing my wounds, they advised me to visit the hospital’s emergency room. There I learnt my head injuries were not serious but my knee had got a gnash that needed help.

It’s only a matter of luck that I'm alive today. I appeal to the authorities to take urgent measures to remove unwanted cables from our streets and skies and save lives.

Kajal Chanda,

BC Block

My neighbours and I are suffering for months because of broken footpaths outside our homes.

The ordeal began five months ago when workers dug up the pavement from Tank 8 till the Eastern Drainage Canal. When asked, the workers claimed they were laying underground electric cables but added confidently that their job ended at breaking the surface. They had no orders to repair it!

It’s been four months since then that we are having to walk over this uneven footpath. There are piles of tiles stacked up in places, which makes it all the more difficult. Our gates are not opening outwards as the uneven ground is blocking it.

We made multiple complaints to the councillor and ward officials but they simply ask us to send photographs of the condition and never follow up.

The ditches they dug were about 2.5ft deep and pedestrians could easily fall into them so we residents have ourselves tried to cover the portions we could with loose bricks and tiles but this is obviously not enough. And it is creating tremendous dust that fills up our homes and gives us allergies and a burning sensation in our throats.

In all our years in Salt Lake, never have we had it so bad.

Sukanta Sanyal,

BL Block