Hyderabad: Political backing for the expansion of religious structures on the city’s roads and pavements has become a major headache for the police department.
Extensions of existing structures like dargahs, temples, chilla, jhanda etc. might snowball into a law and order issue, but can be curbed if the problem is snipped in the bud, say cops.
“In the name of worship, some people are engaging in this kind of activities to establish dominance in an area. We do cooperate with the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation whenever they ask us to, but the police department doesn’t have real powers to curb this menace,” said DCP, South Zone, V. Satyanarayana.
This has become an annual activity before a festival or some political activity and the polls too are near now, point out the cops.
However, as the police department doesn’t have suo motu right, it can only act upon requests from the GHMC.
Expansion works at a dargah near Tappa Chabutra were halted after police intervention not very long ago, the cops pointed out.
Similarly, construction at a temple near Shamsheergunj main road and at another temple on the footpath near Mesco School, Kali Khabar was halted following complaints.
“Works like the above will go on with impunity and the political parties succeed in encroaching the roads with dargahs, jhandas, chillas, temples etc. Both police and GHMC are playing the blame game,” said MBT leader and ex-corporator Mr Amjed Ullah Khan.
Though halted for now, the expansions are not demolished and are causing a problem in the free flow of traffic. Also, the problem doesn’t pertain to one zone of the city.
As per GHMC data, there are nearly 64 major structures encroaching on city’s roads and footpaths.
“We keep bringing this to the notice of GHMC officials. There are plenty of such structures and it is obviously a big problem. The GHMC should act on relocating them,” said DCP (Traffic) Cyberabad, Mr Avinash K. Mohanty.
Zonal level GHMC officials maintain that there is a lot of political pressure to keep the structures intact and the expansions untouched.
A senior official from the Town Planning department said, “In certain cases, the corporation is able to curb the problem. In others, there seems to be an issue. We are trying our best to involve religious leaders, local leaders, police, traffic and others stakeholders to hold talks in explaining about the problem. Results will be possible only with coordination by all departments.”
