No facilities, babus flee Gundala mandal office

Gundala: Gundala in Nalgonda district is a mandal headquarters but no mandal level official stays here as the facilities available here are no better than in a village.

Officials say that if they want to have food they can't find an eatery and there is no degree college or medical facilities.  

The Mandal Revenue Officer (tahsildar) and Mandal Parishat Development Officer and other officials including village officials stay in Hyderabad or Bhongir and commute here.

Experts say officials not staying at the headquarters could be the key reason for lack of focus on implementation of government schemes including those for Individual Household Latrines.

MPDO J. Ravinder says, “I was posted here in September 2015. I stay in Bhongir with my family. I am here at the mandal headquarters most of the time.”

When this correspondent visited Gundala and surrounding villages locals complained that they are not able to meet officials as most of them are not at their offices. But the MPDO rejected this charge and said that he is available in his office.

Bhongir RDO N. Madhusudhan said, “Usually officials stay in the mandal. We are ensuring they operate from headquarters.”

The migration of locals for jobs is also seen on a large scale in these villages. For example, the Chakalivada colony in which college girl K. Rekha died, has only four or five families as all the others have migrated to Chennai to work as watchmen in apartment complexes.

Rekha's uncle K. Venkatesh said, “There are at least 25 households of our community but most of them live in Chennai working as watchmen. I am paid Rs 5,000 a month. We come back here in summer for a few days.”

Caste norms deny dalits individual toilets: Pandey
The caste system is the reason why India is still a developing nation, said social activist and Ramon Magsaysay award winner Sandip Pandey.

Delivering the fifth endowment lecture in memory of late PM P.V. Narasimha Rao at the Kakatiya University on Wednesday, Mr Pandey said the caste system is also the reason for Dalit families being denied individual toilets.

Speaking on ‘The paradox of high growth and worst social indices in the world’ he said India is still lagging behind South Asian countries.

He pointed out that the participation rate of women in the workforce is almost half in India at 29 per cent compared to Bangla-desh which has 57 per cent of women working.

He said even the number of women MPs is higher in Bangladesh than in India. He blamed the BJP-led NDA government for cutting allocations for education and health.

“Many development experts in India keen on using the private sector for school education, would be interested to learn that in Sri Lanka, with its huge lead over India in social indicators, private schools have been banned since 1960s,” Mr Pandey said.

Even though India places itself among BRICS nations its social indices don’t compare with others of the group. For example, the infant mortality rate in India is 47 per 1,000 live births while in China, Brazil and Russia it is 13%, 14% and 10% respectively.

India is also lagging behind in literacy and health outlay. PV Memorial Trust founder Surabhi Vani Devi, KU in-charge Registrar Prof. Kwaja Altaf Hussain, Prof. K. Sitarama Rao, Parcha Kodandarama Rao and others were present.