Transco digs up problems

HYDERABAD: It’s yet another excruciatingly slow paced civic work in progress, and this time it is on the Darulshifa-Chaderghat stretch. Deep trenches dug up along the road for laying cable lines by the APTransco have been left dangerously open and unattended to for the past two months.
Two chunks of the road, around 40 feet long and four feet wide each, were unearthed in front of Abid Ali Khan Eye Hospital and further ahead near New Life Hospital around two months ago.After the digging, the work stopped. Residents and shop owners lament the problems caused by these large pits while APTransco officials said they are awaiting traffic police permission to go ahead with the work. Questioning the logic behind the entire exercise, exasperated locals asked, “Really, why begin the work without taking permission first?”
“I have not seen any activity at the site for the past two months,” said Mohammed Chand Pasha, a resident of the area. “Driving on this stretch during peak hours has become a nightmare thanks to the traffic jams caused by the bottlenecks these pits create.”
Owners of shops complained that the dug up road was affecting their business. “Sales have dropped by around 50% as my shop has become inaccessible for customers,” said Syed Iqbal. “Water from a nearby drain has accumulated in the pit making the whole area dirty with a strong stench emanating from it. The people who come to inspect the site say they are awaiting police permission to complete the work. But we are suffering in the process.”
Employees of Abid Ali Khan Eye Hospital too said that patients and visitors were facing a lot of problems as the pit has engulfed most of their parking space.
Meanwhile, officials of APTransco claim they are helpless. “Technically the underground cable work in that area will take only two months. The work at this point is for a total of 9.5 km of which 8.2 km are already done. But it all depends on when we get the permission from the traffic police to go ahead with the work. They asked us to send a field report and the permission is being processed,” said an official.
Elaborating on the possible reasons behind the delay in giving permission Venkateshwar Rao, chief engineer, APTransco said, “We need to perform horizontal directional drilling (HDD procedure) there during which traffic will have to be diverted. It is a main road and a difficult area to work in. However, we are expecting the permission in the next couple of days.”