Roads win elections

Amitabh Shukla / Chandigarh

A youth returns to Punjab from abroad after five years. His father offers to take him on a joy ride. The youth is surprised to see a profusion of four-lane roads and is extremely impressed.

He asks his father in anglicized Punjabi what is the reason for the turnaround and his father answers that this was due to “Badal sahib” who has made all the roads of the state as smooth as “butter”.

This is not a story but a promotional radio jingle in Punjabi which the Shiromani Akali Dal-BJP has been using to much effect in Punjab to portray the regime as pro-prosperity, pro-infrastructure and pro-development.

A few years ago, when Lalu Prasad Yadav was ruling Bihar by proxy through his wife Rabri Devi, he was asked about the poor condition of roads in the state then. He promised that he will make the roads of the state look like “Hema Malini’s cheeks”. The opposition was quick to respond that it resembled more like “Om Puri’s cheeks”. The turnaround came when Nitish Kumar became the chief minister and the first thing which he did was to focus on roads and make them the showpiece of development.

Excellent roads have become a poll plank of the ruling SAD-BJP combine which they are projecting in a big way for the Punjab elections. The party has realised that in the vehicle crazy state, where getting into the transport business is a fad, owning the latest cars the signature style of the upwardly mobile and aspiring to drive some day the aspiration of even the poor, good, congestion free roads could get them rich electoral dividend.

Impressed with the road building and pro-development stance of Nitish Kumar, SAD President Sukhbir Singh Badal is seeking votes citing the example of Bihar where the NDA government comprising of Janata Dal United and BJP was voted to power for the second time in a row.

“A repeat mandate was must to continue the pace of development of the state. If people of Bihar were wise enough to repeat the mandate for NDA government, same was expected from wise electorate of Punjab,” Sukhbir Badal said, reiterating that NDA in Punjab was seeking votes on the account of development initiatives of SAD-BJP government.

With Congress claiming lack of development and initiative, Sukhbir offered PCC President and Congress leaders a conducted tour of the state “by road” to show the pace of development. The party did not respond to the offer.

As traffic jams in the major cities of the state was a bugbear for the commuters, SAD-BJP claims that in the last five years, it has built 44 railway over-bridges, underpasses or flyovers while the previous Congress government built only 8 in its tenure from 2002 to 2007. Apart from these, the government claims to have spent Rs 6989 crore in the last five years to lay new roads, strengthen the existing ones and four-laning the roads connecting one district to the other, an expenditure which has now helped it portray a pro-development image.

Roads could be there and driving from say state Capital Chandigarh to Amritsar could be a breeze but what has come as a dampener is steep toll tax. A trip from Chandigarh to Amritsar in a personal vehicle could cost upto Rs 150 one way, but people are not complaining as it saves travel time and fuel and allows them to drive at speed of upto 90 kmph on most stretches.

In fact, travelling by roads is such a fad in Punjab that from Chandigarh there are hardly any takers for the Amritsar bound Duronto express and the Railways decided to withdraw four coaches from the train due to poor response with only 25-30 per cent of the seats on offer getting bookings.

There may not be an established correlation between winning elections and excellent roads but miles of black bitumen in front of a person driving a vehicle with cleanly painted white road dividers on the four-lane expressways in almost all parts of Punjab has been a delight. It has brought the desired momentum in the campaign of the SAD-BJP government, something with which the people of the state can relate to.

Even Congress cannot complain about roads as this is something which a voter uses everyday and sees for himself unlike other developmental projects which could be over hyped by the ruling party and criticised by the opposition. (21.1.2012)

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