Deconstructing Suranjan Das Road

Apart from the usual suspects – the civic officials and the contractors – the 4-5 kilometre long Suranjan Das Road, which provides a vital link between Old Madras Road and Old Airport Road, is also a conspiracy involving automobile mechanics, orthopedics and of course those offering quack remedies for neck and back pain. For the medical fraternity the road can be an ideal place to carry out experiments to determine the threshold limit of strain a human bone can be subjected to, before it reconciles to plasters.

In its monsoon glory the stretch near Gitanjali Layout resembles poor man's Venice. The road was meant to be four-laned, but now it has two lanes of antiquated concrete road and two lanes of mini-canal with nearly four-feet deep trenches all along. With the jurisdictional C V Raman Nagar MLA belonging to BJP and a Congress government at Vidhana Soudha, much water is expected to flow down these trenches before a four-lane road becomes a reality.

The stretch from the BEML Gate to HAL Aerospace Division has an uncanny knack of getting inundated with knee deep water, even if there is a 15-minute drizzle. During heavy rains it acquires the menacing ability to even make burly Tata Sumos gasp for breath, due to inundated exhaust pipes.

For those who wish to get a hang of what off-road racing is all about, but loath to drive all the way to the city outskirts, the stretch near the HAL vegetable market could be ideal to learn the basics.

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