Hyderabad: The Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) has been on a demolition spree on the Chintal Basthi main road connecting Khairathabad with Masab Tank/Banjara Hills since Tuesday, January 21, which ended on Wednesday, January 22.
The reason for the demolition was that most of the shops, buildings, and residential houses on Chintal Basthi main road had encroached upon the footpath and road.
The demolitions were carried out amid heavy police presence after the GHMC’s south zone commissioner received complaints from the traffic police that the road had shrunk due to encroachments.
According to Sunitha, GHMC town planning officer who was overseeing the demolitions on Wednesday evening, the road was supposed to be 60-foot, but because of indiscriminate encroachment by the local shops and houses, traffic flow has been severely impacted, and based on the traffic police’s complaint GHMC was taking up the demolition drive.
However, the shopkeepers and residents were shattered by the demolitions just like the ramps and steps leading to their shops were scooped out by the JCBs which have been working throughout the day.
Tens of kiosks, pan shops, chicken centers, flower shops, and footwear shops among many other stores were mercilessly demolished during the drive.
The shopkeepers informed Siasat.com that they were neither warned about the demolition nor were they given any prior notice.
“Had they given us a week, we could have gathered our material. But they just didn’t give us any chance to even speak,” said Asif Mohammed, an owner of a hardware plumbing store, whose material was not only seized but he was also fined Rs 3,000 by GHMC for littering and placing material on the road.
Mohammed Zakir, a resident of Chintal Basthi used to feed his family by running a small chicken center outside a dargah on the main road. His temporary shop (booth), along with other shops was demolished, pushing his family on the road. He was seen shifting whatever was left from the debris of his shop to a nearby scrap dealer on Wednesday night.
“We don’t eat gold. We don’t even eat fine-grain rice. We live on ration and four families used to depend on this one shop. In this government, the rich are growing richer and the lower-middle class is plunging into poverty. KCR government was better. he didn’t trouble the poor,” Zakir told Siasat.com in polished English.
He claimed to have suffered a loss of up to Rs 1,30,000 due to the demolition of his shop.
It is a fact that almost every shop on Chintal Basthi main road has encroached into the road, without even leaving space for building a footpath. It includes big showrooms, restaurants, beauty parlours, supermarkets, apartments, buildings, and more.
However, a blanket application of the medicine called ‘demolition’ was given to everyone.
“We built our house in 1978, and in 1996 we gave 50 sq yds of our property to the government when it wanted to expand the 40 sq ft road to 60 sq ft. However, the cement road was built only in 2017. Even after the construction of the road, they left the ramp leading to our house intact because our area fell inside a curve which didn’t affect the road in any way. Today they are demolishing our steps/ramp, and tomorrow if they want to expand the road to 100 ft, they may demolish our houses,” said Lakshmi, whose husband was so dejected that he told Siasat.com, and even the GHMC town planning officer that “educated people who follow rules can no longer live in India.”
The owner of another building said that they had built the ramps because during the monsoons the entire road gets flooded up to waist-level and his ramp not only acts as a shelter for the passersby but is a necessity for them to enter their house without getting caught in the flood water. Even that reasoning couldn’t convince the GHMC officials.
It was a day of political drama in Chaintal Basthi, as Khairathabad Congress MLA Danam Nagender and Nampally AIMIM MLA Majid Hussain, both of who share the vote bank in the basti which falls in both the constituencies, came in support of the people only on Wednesday, the second day of the demolition.
Watch: AIMIM’s Majid Hussain protests encroachment drive in Hyderabad’s Chintal Basti
Despite Danam Nagender urging the GHMC officials to halt the demolitions till chief minister A Revanth Reddy returned from Davos, the GHMC officials didn’t pay attention to him and carried the demolitions.
Majid Hussain made a temporary sit-in, argued with the GHMC officials, cursed Feroze Khan, his political opponent from Congress, and left the scene.
“There is nothing we can do except stay silent and let them carry on the demolition. If we utter anything they may demolish the entire shop,” Asif Mohammed told Siasat.com.
He also showed how GHMC officials took away 22 tires and 2 drums from the shopkeeper adjacent to his shop, as they were placed on the road.
“After ten days of dull business because of Sankranthi, we thought we could finally make some business. But it has all been destroyed,” he said.
According to the town planning officer, the debris was going to be removed over the night on Wednesday, and a new road would be laid in the area which has been cleared of encroachments so that the road could be brought back to its original form.
