Hyderabad: Residents of Ameenpur, primarily techies, launched a ‘No road, no vote’ campaign on Tuesday. They put up placards on the dangerous potholes urging authorities to make the road motorable. Several ventures have come up in Ameenpur over the past decade, which was recently converted into a municipality from a gram panchayat. The area is close to several IT and Pharma industries. However, the perennial problem of bad road has been haunting the employees who made this area their home. The road was in bad shape when it was a Gram Panchayat and continues to be so, as officials claim a dearth of funds.
A resident and techie, Mr Venkat Arun Kumar said, “My family member was seriously taken sick and it took an ambulance 20 minutes to cover the distance of a kilometre, due to bad roads. Accidents, miscarriages and spinal problems are the most common health issues being faced by residents. Two families had a miscarriage and bad road was one of the reasons cited. Another resident, Vikram, met with a major accident due to lack of streetlights and bad roads, and has been hospitalised for two months and is still recovering”.
Several representations were given to officials, which fell on deaf ears. The issue was taken to the notice of caretaker MAUD minister K.T. Rama Rao who promised on twitter that he would visit the place but did not come. Even MAUD Principal Secretary Arvind Kumar instructed authorities via a tweet to look into the issue but on the ground everything remains the same.
A software engineer Ms Anusha Yadav, who is six months pregnant said, “After hearing about the incidents of miscarriages, I get extremely tensed when I go out. I hold my stomach tight and at night when I am returning from work it is another nightmare. I have been living here for the past 2.5 years and the road is getting worse each day. The doctor suggested avoiding a bike journey completely”.
Residents alleged because of the condition of roads, the residents faced a health issue. On Sunday, residents took out a rally urging that roads be repaired “or do not ask for votes”. Again there was no response. Techies alleged that parties come during election times with promises and this has been going on for 8years, but they couldn’t even get one road repaired.
