The Hindu : Andhra Pradesh / Hyderabad News : Official apathy to the fore

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Jul 25, 2006

Andhra Pradesh

Andhra Pradesh - Hyderabad

Official apathy to the fore

Staff Reporter

While the culvert is a heap of debris forcing residents to take winding detours, the West Marredpally road speaks of utter neglect

HYDERABAD: One does not have to roam around the entire Secunderabad Cantonment to understand what official apathy means. Ward IV, which ironically houses the Cantonment main office, has two unmatched examples for that.

The first is the culvert over nala near Picket. It was demolished by the SCB in February 2005 and is yet to be rebuilt. The second is the tattered West Marredpally road.

Hopes belied

Residents of this ward, the third largest in the SCB and the only one that has the reservation tag for polls this time, say they went wrong by hoping that their problems would be solved as the SCB head office was nearby. "But that has never happened," says social activist J. Umeshwar Rao.

With the culvert remaining a mere heap of debris, residents of Vijaynagar Colony, MES Colony, Akula Narayana Colony and Subba Rao Colony are forced to take winding detours to reach the Picket main road. As if absence of the culvert is not enough, the nala itself is a dreadful presence in the area. Encroached at most places, its flooding during monsoon is a natural phenomenon. So is apathy of the SCB.

The West Marredpally road, dug up by the Metro Water Board, is an age-old story, as is the snail pace of the SCB to repair it. Last heard, tenders were finalised but work was stopped in view of the election Code of Conduct.

Changed colours

For the political spectacle here, there are two seasoned campaigners -- D.B. Devender of the Congress and former Board member P. Venkat Rao, who has changed his BJP attire to embrace the Telugu Desam's blazing yellow.

Anand of BJP, P. Sudarshanam of the CPI(M) and S. Venkatesh are also among those vying for a share of the voter pie. Venkat Rao had won from Ward IV in 1997 on a BJP ticket. This time, however, with quite a few TDP and Congress dissidents, voting here could assume new patterns.

"It is open. Jo jeeta wohi sikander," is what one `observer' has to say.

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