Hyderabad: Every year, Rs 1.50 crore is spent towards corporators’ study tours – Rs 80,000 on each – but so far not a single plan recommended as a result of these trips have been executed. Contaminated water, overflowing drains, defective pipelines, battered roads and piles of garbage are proof of this.
From stay in 5 star accommodations to food and travel, the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation, foots all the bills including those of the spouse. This year expenditure per spouse came to around Rs 45,000.
Currently, a team of Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation corporators, along with the deputy mayor, are on a study tour in Kashmir. Twenty corporators have taken their spouses along. A senior official of Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation who didn’t want to be named, said, “After the study tour, the corporators are supposed to submit their observations and recommendation.
But most of them are irrelevant, and the reports are for namesake. For example, in 2012 a team visited the Gangtok Municipal Corporation, the entire area of Gangtok is 19 square km and the main source of income is tourism.
Few corporators, based on their observations, submitted reports on implementing solid waste management projects, which was not new. Similarly, the corporators visited Darjeeling Municipal Corporation, which has only 32 wards and the total budget is only Rs 35 crore per year, whereas Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation ’s budget is nearly Rs 4,500 crore and property tax collected crosses Rs 1,000 crore.”
The Lokayukta had taken a serious view and asked for reports from groups visiting different cities about the best practices being implemented there and whether such practices were suitable for Hyderabad. It was dismayed at the corporators’ choice of destinations and had also sought explanations from the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation as to how the earlier trips helped in developing the city.
