As Road Designer

I’m based out in Orissa, specifically at Panaspatna near Balkati. My name is Chittaranjan Sahoo, and this is where I run As Road Designer. It’s a quiet area in the Khurda district. I don’t have a fancy office in the city center. I work from here, surrounded by maps and sketches of different road projects. The roads around here are what keep me busy. I spend a lot of time looking at the land and figuring out how things should be laid out. It’s a lot of technical work, but I enjoy the quiet of the village while I’m doing it. My setup is pretty basic with just a large table for my drawings and a computer for the more detailed bits. People from the local community know me, and they know where the house is. We don't do much advertising because the work usually speaks for itself. It’s about making sure the connections between towns are solid. Sometimes I have to travel out to the sites to see the dirt for myself. It’s not always easy, especially when the monsoon hits and the paths get muddy. But it’s part of the job. I’ve been doing this for several years now from this same spot. It’s a practical life, and I like that I can contribute something real to the area without needing a big corporate office. I just take the projects as they come to me one by one.