Hyderabad: 60 ‘dark spots’ where women are vulnerable

Hyderabad: After numerous complaints of chain snatching and incidents of harassment, Delhi identified 100 ‘dark spots’ and spent Rs 100 crore on better illumination.

Hyderabad is no different when it comes to women being subjected to harassment and chain-snatching, even in residential colonies, and the poor illumination in public spaces is making it easy for the criminals here too.

Within Hyderabad there are 50 to 60 such dark spots. Sai Teja, a civic activist, says that “on the way from Pragathi nagar to Gandimaisama Road, the stretch from Jagathgiri gutta to Shapur and several pockets in Sikh village, the street lights are not operational. If a single light is defused, the area is still illuminated, but many pockets along the entire stretch have no lighting.”

Ironically, many street lights are un-operational in Kundanbagh where clusters of IAS, IPS officers reside.

A similar condition prevails in MLA colony in Banjara Hills. In February alone, an enquiry by the then Commissioner of the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation revealed that close to 20,000 street lights had conked off.

Even after repeated complaints, the civic body takes days to replace fused bulbs or do any repairs.

A majority of complaints at the GHMC's online desk after bad road and uncollected garbage, are for un-operational street lights.

Besides dark spots, the city traffic police have identified 19 black spots which are prone to accidents.

The traffic police has suggested that the GHMC rectify the engineering defects that cause such spots in order to prevent loss of life.

These spots were identified based on 2018 accident data.

The black spots on Necklace Road and Jalavihar Road are causing grave concern as more than 20 persons have died on these stretches, which is alarmingly high and ought to have been attended to immediately.