Hyderabad: One of the beneficial spin-offs of hosting the Global Entrepreneurship Summit was that the roads of Hyderabad magically became pothole-free. But yet another benefit is that some areas such as Golconda were also made mosquito-free to ensure that the August gathering that dined at the Fort could do so in comfort.
There were 2,184 reported malaria cases and 1,185 reported dengue cases in the city in 2016, and doctors say that this year’s statistics will be even bleaker, but this is not something the city and state administration wanted to showcase. Residents are constantly raising concerns about mosquito infested areas in the city, especially in residential localities and near garbage disposal sites, and the municipal authorities cite the high expense of anti-mosquito operations as a reason for not doing much.
But for the foreign delegates nothing was too expensive. V. Venkatesh, chief entomology officer of the GHMC, said that “to reduce the number of mosquitoes, we cleaned the nearby lake of waste and also fogged inside the fort and nearby residential areas. This was not fully chemicals as we did not want to cause any effect on the walls of the fort so we combined chemicals with herbal concoctions.” The additional cost for the activity was the salaries of the GHMC officials who undertook the work and the procurement of the chemicals which cost roughly Rs 2 lakh, though sources say it might have cost more. The cleaning activities started 10 days before the dinner.
The clean-up was confined to a three-kilometre radius of the fort; doing it for the whole city will cost a lot more, though lakes and parks can be cleaned for just Rs 1 lakh each. A GHMC official said that for the dinner, the lake and nearby green areas were cleaned up first, “so maybe instead of the whole city, problematic areas could be picked, but citizens should ensure that these areas are kept clean henceforth.”
Selective areas
- The nearby lake was cleaned and inside of the fort was fogged along with nearby residential areas.
- The anti-mosquito operations were confined to a three-km radius of the fort. A rough amount of Rs 2 lakh was spent for the procurement of the chemicals.
- 2,184 Malaria cases reported in 2016
