Patiala ki Rao bane of villages bordering Haryana

Sanjay Bumbroo

Mohali, July 7

The car that was swept away in the flash floods in Patiala ki Rao rivulet at Tanda village has once again exposed lack of basic infrastructure at several Mohali villages bordering Haryana.

Village residents, talking to The Tribune, said the state government was to blame for the mishap as it had failed to construct small bridges over the rivulet. They said had the government constructed bridges, the incident wouldn’t have occurred. They said if the state government didn’t want to provide basic infrastructure to the border villages, it should transfer these to Haryana, which had relatively better amenities.

Snakes its way From Shivaliks to Ghaggar

• Rivulet originates from Shivalik foothills, enters Mohali & UT on way
• After crossing 30 km, merges into the Ghaggar at Chuni village
• Feeds rainwater into Ghaggar from Kharar, Landran areas having 26 villages

Tanda Karor village in Kharar tehsil of Mohali district is 20 km from Chandigarh, but when it comes to amenities, it seems to be ages away. There is no proper road and one has to trudge through Patiala ki Rao, which remains filled with water at several places, to approach the village.

Balbir Singh, a resident, said during rainy season, they, especially schoolchildren, had to wait for hours for water to recede to cross the rivulet. He said the village panchayat had been writing to the authorities to construct bridges, but to no avail.

Satnam Singh Dhand, another resident, said had to rely on cars or tractors of other people to carry seriously ill patients to hospitals in Mohali or Chandigarh.

He said during the elections, candidates of various political parties visited their village and made tall promises of constructing bridges over the rivulet, but to no avail.

A village in adjoining Haryana, with a population of 300, had all basis amenities. In contrast, their villages lacked basic facilities such as roads, bridges and public transport, he added.

Tanda sarpanch Balwinder Kaur said over the past two decades, they had written to successive governments seeking construction of bridges but no step had been taken in this regard. She said every year after floods, officials visited the village and carried out surveys but nothing concrete had been done to mitigate their problems.