This Road Has Been Pothole Free For 50-Years: Contractor Fired Because Of This!
A pothole-free road in India? You’d say that there isn’t anything like that! However, we would like to tell you that there is indeed a road in India that has been pothole-free for not just 5 years, 10 years, or even 25 years; rather, this particular road has been free of any potholes or major repair work for the last 50 years. We are talking about the civic marvel—the Jangli Maharaj Road, or JM Road—in Pune, Maharashtra. Unfortunately, there is a very sad side to the story behind the road that has not troubled people driving on it for over five decades.
Today, we will be telling you all about JM Road in Pune, Maharashtra, which was built back in 1976 and remains one of the very few roads in India that has been pothole-free for more than 50 years. This particular 2.5 km road was built by Recondo, a company run by two Parsi brothers from Mumbai. These brothers built this road and gave the Pune Municipal Corporation a written warranty for it.
Back in 1972, Pune suffered from a drought, and the following year, in 1973, it suffered from a flood that destroyed all major roads in the city. As a result, Shrikant Shirole, a 21-year-old PMC Standing Committee Chairman, wanted to build a durable road for the city after taking note of the weather-resistant roads of Mumbai.
For this, he discovered the company Recondo, which, as mentioned, was a Mumbai-based construction company run by two Parsi brothers. This company was awarded the contract to construct the 2.5 km-long JM Road in Pune by bypassing the public tendering process, owing to the company’s reputation for using the “Hot Mix” road construction technique, which was very new at the time.
Recondo was given the tender for Rs 15 lakh to build this road, and it was inaugurated on January 1, 1976. The company used Hot Mix technology, which aggregated heated mixed bitumen. It was laid and then compacted while still hot to ensure the roads were smooth and had a durable surface. This technology was very new at the time.
The JM Road was constructed with the best quality materials and strict workmanship. Additionally, to make the road future-proof, ducts for cables and stormwater were placed along the road edges to prevent digging in the future. The road was designed in a way that ensured it could handle axle loads from heavy vehicles without damage.
What’s even more impressive about Recondo’s road construction is that the company gave the Pune Municipal Corporation a 10-year warranty in writing. The company stated that if the road required any work within 10 years, they would reconstruct it with their own money. Ever since 1976, the road has only received minor maintenance once, in 2010, and a makeover in 2014.
What’s extremely sad about this story is that, after delivering such an impressive road with a written warranty, you’d think that Recondo must have received a number of new road projects, right? Well, the answer is quite unfortunate. Following the JM Road construction, Recondo did not receive any further road work from the Pune Municipal Corporation.