Hyderabad: The governmen’s slow response to serious matters and red tapism are responsible for the manhole tragedy at Ayyappa Society on Saturday which killed four people.
Speaking to DC HMWSSB MD Dana Kishore said he had written a letter to the government 20 days ago asking to blacklist the contractor, GSK Infrastructure, who was responsible for the death of the four persons. The government failed to blacklist GSK Infrastructure, and that gave a freehand to it to bid for civil works. However, Kishore said that in the last 20 days he had stopped the contractor from executing four different works for which they had submitted tenders.
Kishore said GSK Infrastructure had sublet the work at Ayyappa Society illegally to another contractor named Loka Reddy. As per rules the sublet contractor should have informed HMWSSB before taking up work. That also was not done.
On Sunday Kishore ordered a magisterial inquiry by the joint collector of RR district into the deaths. He said the probe would yield a factual report on the issue.
Till Sunday no action was taken against any HMWSSB official as the probe report was ready. It is expected to be submitted by Monday. If on Monday any official from the Water Board is found guilty action will be taken although it is a holiday, the MD said.
Mr Kishore said that each victim’s family will be paid Rs 2.5 lakh by the Water Board and another Rs 50,000 from the CM’s relief sund. Apart from this Rs 7.5 lakh will be paid by the contractor to the kin of each victim.
