High level corruption: Manhole on funds fraud opens

Hyderabad: High level corruption has been unearthed in Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation’s maintenance wing. 

The civic body officials have swindled more than Rs 50 crore through replacement and repair of manhole covers. The racket came to light after the civic body’s field level staff conducted a ground survey for chalking out ‘No Open Manhole’ policy in the city.

According to official sources, there were only about 35 lakh manhole cover repairs and replacements out of about 2.5 lakh manholes were maintained by the civic body. However, the officials were shocked to learn as per the records maintained by ground level staff, they have been replacing more than 2,000 manholes on a monthly basis until the survey. Investigating officials have claimed that lack of transparency and accountability has given the officials the scope to indulge in such irregularities.

According to the official data collected from the civic body, there are over 2,96,329 sewer manhole and 1,22,461 catch pits in Greater Hyderabad region which are being maintained by GHMC. This apart, there are over 1.85 lakh sewer manholes which is maintained by Hyderabad Metropolitan Water Supply and Sewerage Board.

Sources said that for the past several years, the ground level staff have been replacing at least 2,000 manhole and catch-pit covers across the city every month. Since the last two years, the corporation staff has replaced 23,852 manholes. With each manhole cover costing '4,500, the expenditure shown towards the purchase or repair of manholes is mammoth. 

A huge number of manhole covers were replaced in the newly formed LB Nagar, Khairatabad and Charminar zones. Officials claimed that they have been damaged due to being run over by heavy vehicles. Surprisingly, barring LB Nagar zone, heavy vehicles are not allowed in Charminar and Khairatabad zones. Rough estimates by the civic body said that about '50 crore have been swindled by ground level staff so far.

A senior GHMC official, admitting to irregularities in manhole cover replacement, said there was hardly any mechanism to curb the irregularities. “Citizens often blame GHMC for road damages and media organisations do not highlight the manhole cover replacement issue assuming that it could be a minor problem even though a number of lives have been lost”, he said.

The official said that the higher authorities have to blindly believe the ground level staff since they cannot inspect at the ground level which has resulted in wastage of public money.

The GHMC official further said maintenance of manholes and frames is proving to be a tough task for the organisation due to frequent complaints of damage or open manholes from residents. 

“To address the issue, the GHMC last week launched ‘No Open Manhole’ policy to attend to the complaints and to fix them at the earliest. Unlike yesteryears, the corporation has been asking the ground level staff for photo identity with location. All duplicate entries will be filtered,” he added.

The Corporation is now exploring Fibre Reinforced Plastic manhole covers to ensure longevity. The cost of a FRP manhole cover is 25 percent extra than the cement concrete manhole cover.