LAST RESORT: Bylanes are turning out to be a good option for the owners to park their vehicles in Hyderabad. — Photo: Mohd. Yousuf

HYDERABAD: With the wedding season taking off, marriage halls in the city are turning out to be fresh bottlenecks for vehicular movement due to lack of parking lots besides absence of specific regulations to check the problem.

The city has already witnessed two major traffic problems at Chaderghat and Rethibowli within a week following haphazard parking of the vehicles in front of marriage halls.

Those attending the weddings park vehicles outside the halls leaving little space on the main roads, which always teem with hundreds of vehicles. Sometimes, the traffic comes to standstill for more than two hours and hall managements rarely try to regulate the vehicles.

According to the traffic police, over 110 marriage halls are situated in the main areas at Tarbund, Sikh Village, Bowenpally, Karkhana, Champapet, L.B. Nagar, Gudimalkapur, Rethibowli and Attapur. The managements have ensured all the facilities, including lush green gardens and water fountains. Most of them choose to forget about providing parking lots.

`Exorbitant rates'

One classic case is the highway route from CTO junction near Paradise towards Sikh Village and Bowenpally where several halls are on the main road. Even the Rajiv Rahadari, with a cluster of halls in Karkhana and beyond, faces the same problem. In case of a wedding or reception, managements of function halls utilise the entire open space on their campus for erecting `shamiyanas,' instead of allowing parking there.

Almost similar is the situation on the road at Champapet.

However, police officials say the reason for frequent traffic snarls is lack of regulations on part of any Government department. "An open space is being developed easily into a hall by erecting a shed and then given on rent charging exorbitant rates," Additional Commissioner of Police (Traffic) A. K. Khan points out.

Additional Deputy Commissioner of Police (Traffic-I) G. Sampath Kumar Reddy explains:

"Our men have begun seizing parked vehicles after hall managements have failed to respond to notices served on them."

According to Municipal Corporation of Hyderabad Chief City Planner B. Purushottam Reddy, new guidelines have been formulated for new hotels, restaurants and marriage halls to provide 40 per cent of the built-up area for parking.

The hall owners, however, are too busy to bother.

Marriage meet

Sangham and Janmabandam would hold a matrimonial meet `Naveena Suyamvaram' for all South Indian Brahmins (Iyer/Iyengar/Madhwa/Telugu) on Sunday, February 11, at Subramanya Swamy Devalaya Kalyana Mandapam, Skandagiri, Secunderabad, according to a press release from the two cultural organisations here on Monday.

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