Hyderabad: While the Musi river is the only outlet for the city and the number of encroachments is increasing, the entire river bed could turn into a concrete base with the recent plan of the state government to construct a 42-km bridge parallel to the river. Over 40 per cent of the river bed is already occupied, shrinking the river size.
There are over 10,000 houses along the stretch of Musi, which crosses six Assembly constituencies in the old city.
According to environmental expert Vedakumar, president of the Forum for Better Hyderabad, there are several reasons why the Musi does not have water.
These include degradation of the catchment of Musi upstream in Vikarabad; impounding of water at Osmansagar and degradation of the-ir immediate catchment area; Change in drainage pattern of Hyderabad affecting free flow of water into the Musi from various directions; and disruption of the inter-linkage of the numerous tanks in the region and their encroachments overtime.
Geo-ecologist and urban planning expert Sai Basker Reddy, said, “There are occupations all along the river, which has not been addres-sed. The proposed bri-dge could lead to inundation. Besides, the history of the river will be lost.”
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