Hyderabad: Over the last five years, though the Centre sanctioned Rs 59 crore towards development of slums in Hyderabad, the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation took up no work from 2011 to 2014.
It spent only Rs 9.8 crore in 2014-2015 towards the project. Around Rs 50 crore was left unspent by the corporation.
In 2010 GHMC had taken up massive slum free city plan of action covering over 1,476 slums which need basic amenities.
The GHMC council had approved the proposal to make Hyderabad a slum free city and appointed two consultants to prepare a detailed report. And by 2016 by spending over Rs 12,500 crore, Hyderabad was said to be a slum free city.
In the first year, the consultant prepared a project report for 290 slums covering only limited work at an estimated Rs 545 crore and sent it to the Centre, but it was not approved since GOI suggested taking up one pilot project covering all works.
Accordingly Keshavanagar slum was selected for a pilot project at an estimated cost of Rs 59 crore for which the GOI approved and released the funds. However, the RTI information revealed a different story.
Mr M. Padmanabhan Reddy, secretary of Forum for Good Governance said, “As against 1,476 slums needing basic civic amenities only two slums Keshava Nagar and IDH Colony were taken up during the last five years by spending Rs 9.8 crore which includes Rs 2.47 crore given to two consultants for preparing the project.
When 30 lakh people are living in slums in need of basic amenities, the state government and GHMC has proposed to go ahead with other expensive projects which is of not much use.
