Gokhale Bridge: Citizens band via banners, WhatsApp on timeline – Hindustan Times

Mumbai: The citizens of Andheri and the nearby areas have joined hands to raise their voices and demand accountability for the completion of the Gokhale Bridge on time. The bridge was shut down on November 7, which led to a huge outcry from the public.

Besides taking to Twitter, to raise their displeasure, citizens formed a WhatsApp group, and also conducted a public meeting with the Andheri West MLA, Ameet Satam. The group is called Gokhale Bridge ASAP (as soon as possible) and ASAP 1 and has more than 600 members combined. The Elected representatives also joined those groups to understand the sentiments of people and give reports on what is happening on the bridge.

After the initial public meeting with Satam, some members formed an action group to decide on future steps to be taken by citizens. “We have no choice but to raise our grievances in the best way possible. Citizens from the area are in so much trouble,” said Jiten Budhdeo, a resident of Vile Parle West.

On December 14, Budhdeo, along with other citizens, launched a banner campaign. “We have hung several banners in a few buildings. I plan to personally go to buildings in my area asking them to join in the banner campaigns. We want the elected representatives to see what our demands are,” he added.

The Gokhale Bridge – a part of which collapsed in 2018, killing two – is a key connector between Andheri East and West, and is one of the busiest routes in the western suburb. Following the collapse, the bridge was only kept partially open while Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) worked on building it again in phases. The collapse has also triggered BMC to announce routine audits of all the bridges in the city.

During such an audit in September, it was announced that the bridge was unsafe and it was completely shut. Citizens, after initial shock by the closure of the bridge which led to huge inconvenience, strategised on how to keep the public pressure intact on the civic body and the elected representatives to open the bridge as per their committed timeline.

After the outcry, BMC’s Additional Commissioner (Project), P Velrasu visited the site on November 9 and BMC announced that one portion of the bridge (2 lanes) will open by May 2023 and the remaining portion by September 2023.

“Unlike old times, now we have the tools and technology to raise our grievances and discomfort to elected representatives. We can use platforms like Twitter or write emails to authorities and elected representatives,” said Dinesh Mehta, one of the members of the WhatsApp group. “I am glad to see that we can bring change. From an initial announcement of 2 years, we were told that one portion of the bridge will be completed in the next 6 months. This is an achievement and we will continue to keep tracking the progress of the construction.”

Besides daily chatter about the bridge and issues surrounding the alternate routes, citizens even visited the civic officials asking for updates about the bridges.

Activist and Member of the WhatsApp group Zoru Bhatena also shared documents on the proposed drawings of the bridge as uploaded by BMC on their website for citizens to understand what is the proposed bridge and how much of the work is pending.

Meanwhile, citizens have now launched a countdown timer on a web page which shows the number of days before the bridge will open to the public.

Dhaval Shah, who represents Andheri Lokhandwala Oshiwara Citizens association created a webpage ‘myloca.net’ which displays the countdown timer. “This is an important bridge. We want the BMC to give us a schedule on how they plan to finish the construction of the bridge, and the stages of the construction. So that we can track whether they are on time or not. BMC cannot just keep saying we are on schedule and not share the schedule.”

Shah and his team had also started an online petition asking the leaders to let the Indian Army build the Gokhale Bridge.