Spothole: An App That Can Save A Life

THE POTHOLE MAN

On July 28, 2015, a terrible accident occurred which shattered Mr.Dadarao Bhilore’s family.His 16-year-old son, Prakash Bhilore had lost his life when he met with an accident because of a pothole on Jogeshwari-Vikhroli Link Road in Mumbai. Within a year, when Bilhore did not find any necessary action taken by the authority e awakened a sense of and brought it upon himself to fill the potholes.

Image credit:(Better India) https://www.thebetterindia.com/152280/mumbaikar-potholes-dadarao-bilhore/

In a conversation with ANI, he said,

“I don't want people to face the same fate as my son, Prakash. I will keep working till India becomes pothole-free. Our nation has a huge population. If even one lakh people start filling potholes, India will become pothole-free. I am tired, but I will not stop.”

Has the situation improved? It’s complicated. Dadarao Bilhore has filled more than 500 potholes in the city and yet, The BMC is just twiddling their thumbs on their desk. The situation in Mumbai is diffusing because of him. The death of his own really crushed him and his sincerity is now taking care of the roads in Mumbai and protecting us so that we don’t share a similar fate.

The initiative by the one man army is growing and many volunteers are joining him in his efforts and speeding up the process of filling the potholes.

Back in 2018, he launched an app called Spothole, which takes the help of fellow citizens together locate potholes and resolve the issue, this app can be an effective solution to get the citizens involved and influence active participation.Speaking about the app to The Asian Age, he said,

“The app uses three basic features already available in a smart phone — mobile camera, GPS, and an internet connection — and enables citizens to accomplish half the job by distributing power and much-needed responsibility to a crowd-sourced model. The first step to fix a pothole is to mark it. Spotholes helps you point out the pothole to the BMC who can then take cognizance of it.”

We need people like Dadarao Bhilore to inspire the younger generations and call the attention of government on trivial matters and solve them immediately so that no family has to go through this traumatic experience of losing a loved one because of a mere pothole, a problem which shouldn’t have been created in the first place and if it did, why wasn’t it solved in all these years?