Decades long wait ends; Alappuzha bypass open for traffic

Alappuzha: Union Minister Nitin Gadkari and Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan jointly inaugurated the 6.8-kilometre two-lane Alappuzha bypass on NH66, putting an end for a wait of nearly five decades.

The 6.8-km two-lane bypass, passing through the western side of NH 66, links Kommady in the north to Kalarcode in the south.

The project was first mooted in the early 1970s. Although the first phase work was launched in 1980, the project got delayed on various accounts. On April 10, 2015, it was put back on track with a deadline of September 2017. However, the project got delayed further due to various reasons, including getting permission from Railways to place girders over the railway track as part of the construction of two rail overbridges (ROBs) at Malikamukku and Kuthirapanthy.

One of the major features of the bypass is a 4.8-km stretch of elevated highway that passes beside the Alappuzha beach. Of this, 3.2 km is flyover.

The project has been implemented at ₹348 crore with equal shares borne by the Union and State governments. Besides, the State government spent an additional ₹25 crore for developing Kalarcode and Kommady Junctions, installing street lights among other works.

During the inaugural function the Kerala Chief Minister lauded the joint efforts of the Centre and the state government in executing the project.

He said that the bypass will reduce the traffic bottlenecks on the Thiruvananthapuram-Ernakulam stretch. Earlier, due to massive traffic jams, it was a one hour travel on the stretch, but now the journey would be completed in less than ten minutes.

Vijayan added that of the total cost of Rs 364 crore for the project, the Centre had provided Rs 164 crore, whereas the state government spent Rs 200 crore.

Gadkari had invited the Kerala Chief Minister to New Delhi to discuss the pending highway projects and said that the problems could only be fixed if there is proper communication between the two governments.

Speaking on the occasion, Kerala PWD Minister G. Sudhakaran said: "This is a dream come true and the will and support of both the central and the state governments has transformed this project into a reality."

He lashed out at the Congress, saying that the project got delayed during its regime for several years on various accounts.

Sudhakaran hailed the services rendered by the PWD engineers and said that it was the hard work and technical proficiency of the team which helped in the completion of the project.

Meanwhile, the fanfare of the event was marred by a controversy as Congress MP KC Venugopal was not invited for the function.

Alappuzha Congress Committee president, M. Liju said, "It was Venugopal who had completed all the basic work of the Alappuzha bypass when he was the local MP. Not inviting him for this function is a bad political precedent and the CPI-(M) and BJP seem to have joined together for a Congress-Mukt Bharat."

KC Venugopal said that though he was not invited, he was elated that the project, for which he took tremendous effort, was thrown open for the public.