Every time a young life is lost in a road accident, it leaves behind shattered families, unanswered questions, and hollow promises.
The tears shed by grieving parents, the wails of friends, and the helpless silence of a community mourning yet another tragic death are never heard in the marble-floored offices of those in power. Because these deaths – caused by neglected roads, cratered lanes, and treacherous turns – are not the concern of politicians or bureaucrats. They are the burden of the poor, the everyday people, the very citizens whose votes bring governments to power and whose taxes pay for the luxuries of the elite.
Ask yourself this: Have you ever heard of a minister’s son dying due to a pothole? Has a bureaucrat’s convoy ever been swallowed by the broken backroads of our villages? Never.
Because for them, roads are miraculously smooth, streetlights functional, and infrastructure always in top gear. It is the common man – the bus driver, the college student, the young boy on a two-wheeler returning home from work, who faces the wrath of roads that were never repaired, lanes that were never levelled, and promises that were never fulfilled.
In Goa, from Mapusa to Saligao, and across parts of South Goa, the story repeats itself like a tragic ballad.
Potholes are not just road defects; they are death traps waiting for their next victim. Internal roads, especially in rural pockets, have become infamous for their dangerous condition – narrow stretches, lack of signage, poor lighting, and crater-sized holes that vehicles plunge into unexpectedly. Each monsoon, these roads deteriorate further, but the response remains the same: a photo-op of an inspection, a promise of repair “after the rains,” and then, silence.
What’s worse is the normalization of these tragedies. A youth dies in an accident, a few headlines are made, and within days, they are reduced to statistics — mere numbers in a report, soon forgotten. There is no accountability. No one is held responsible. The system shrugs, blames “rash driving” or “speeding,” and moves on. But the mother who lost her son, the sister who no longer waits at the bus stop, and the friend who cycles alone to college — they never move on. They live with the injustice every single day.
Development is happening, they say. Goa is progressing, they claim. But for whom? Urban centers may be witnessing fancy flyovers, multi-lane highways, and beautification projects. But rural Goa — the soul of our state — continues to be ignored. Internal roads are collapsing, but they don’t make headlines because they don’t lead to casinos or airports. The youth in these regions are the silent victims of this unequal growth, paying the price of neglect with their lives.
What we need is not just a few press releases or patchwork repairs. We need a complete overhaul of how infrastructure is planned and maintained. Accountability must be fixed. If a pothole causes a death, someone must be held criminally responsible. Road safety should not be an afterthought; it should be the foundation of any development model. And above all, the voices of the common people must be heard — not just during elections, but every single day.
This is not just a call for better roads. This is a plea for dignity. A demand for justice. And a reminder that every life matters — not just the ones who sit in power, but the ones who vote them into it.
Until we reach a day when a poor man’s death on the road is seen with the same urgency as any VIP’s inconvenience, we cannot call ourselves a just society.
Let the potholes not just be seen as holes in the road, but as scars on the conscience of our governance.
