Hyderabad floods: 200-km roads battered; 3,000 cars need repair

Hyderabad: Floods in several areas of Hyderabad over the past two days caused huge monetary loss for damaged civil infrastructure like roads and financial losses to car and bike owners and also property loss, mostly due to burning of electric metres in cellars.

Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation’s initial estimates are that about Rs 60 crore will be needed to relay around 200 lane kilometres of roads that have been damaged. GHMC executive engineer (Disaster Cell) R. Srinivas Reddy said, “We need Rs 30 lakh to relay each lane kilometer of road, totalling to about Rs 60 crore.”

Outside Hyderabad, from September 11 to September 20, the government has estimated around 8,788 hectare of crop damage, mostly in Adilabad, Ranga Reddy and Mahbubnagar.

Though only five houses collapsing were reported in the city, around 3,000 cars and 5,000 bikes were damaged over the last two days in Nizampet, Bhandari Layout and Quthbullapur.

Insurance companies have been receiving claims for bikes and cars from these localities. The GHMC disaster control room informed that one car was completely washed away, in Macha Bollarum.

Hyderabad now has five sinkholes

Three more sinkholes opened up on Thursday, taking the total to five after just two days of rain. A one-metre diameter sinkhole opened up on the road opposite HDFC Bank in Basheerbagh and another one on the road at King Koti.

Earlier in the day, a four-foot deep sinkhole formed on the Shivam Road near Amberpet on Thursday, the third after two days of rain following the ones on NTR Marg and at Neredmet.

A tanker-trolley got stuck in the Shivam Road sinkhole at about 6 am on Thursday, and was cleared using two large cranes at about noon. The accident caused a massive traffic jam and congestion along the busy road from Osmania University to Amberpet. Traffic police barricaded the sinkhole, even as emergency repairs were being undertaken.

At Basheerbagh, Narayanaguda traffic inspector A. Balaji said he and his team had barricaded the sinkholes. “The road at Basheerbagh is a busy route. We have diverted traffic from one side of the road. GHMC and water works officials will begin repairs from Friday morning,” he said.

About the massive NTR Marg sinkhole that had opened up on Wednesday, Sewerage and Water Board MD M. Dana Kishore said six teams had been set up to reduce water flow into the site.

Emergency response teams have been posted at the sinkhole itself. Infrastructure Repairs will begin after the flow of water stops. Another sinkhole had opened at Neredmet on Wednesday.