Delhi PWD Minister Parvesh Verma has blamed the previous Aam Aadmi Party government for traffic jams on the Barapulla Phase 3 elevated corridor, arguing that key design and construction decisions had already been made before the current government took office.
Verma said the corridor’s design was prepared and approved during the previous government’s tenure, when construction also began. By the time the present government assumed office, 288 of the project’s 298 pillars had reportedly been completed, leaving little scope for a major redesign, according to the minister’s statement reported by Jagran.
The minister said the congestion was linked to decisions taken during the project’s planning and construction stages. He also claimed that the corridor could have been widened by two lanes on each side because sufficient space was available around the project area.
The Barapulla Phase 3 corridor is located near two major and comparatively wide road links. Verma referred to National Highway 9 on one side and the Delhi-Noida-Direct flyway on the other, saying that the surrounding road network had adequate width. He alleged that the earlier project planning did not sufficiently account for this wider road context.
The minister’s comments came after videos showing traffic congestion on Barapulla Phase 3 were used to question the performance of the current government. Verma rejected the criticism, saying that most of the important decisions concerning the corridor’s design and construction had been taken under the previous administration.
The dispute places the corridor’s traffic performance within a broader question of how elevated road projects are designed and integrated with roads at ground level. In the account provided by the minister, the principal constraint is not land availability but the late stage at which the current government inherited the project. With most of the pillars already built, changing the alignment or widening the structure would have required changes after substantial construction had been completed.
The available report does not provide traffic counts, details of the corridor’s lane configuration, the current operating arrangement, or an independent engineering assessment of the causes of congestion. It also does not specify whether any structural, traffic-management or junction-level changes have been approved in response to the jams.
Verma’s statement therefore establishes the government’s explanation for the congestion, but not a conclusive technical finding on the corridor’s performance. The immediate public issue remains the movement of vehicles through and around Barapulla Phase 3, while the political dispute centres on responsibility for the project’s design.
The minister’s comments followed the circulation of congestion videos and the government’s response to questions over the corridor. Any further measures, including changes to traffic operations or the project design, would need to be announced by the Public Works Department or other responsible authorities.
