Hyderabad: Thousands of people thronged the Miyapur Metro Station to witness Prime Minister Narendra Modi inaugurating the Hyderabad Metro Rail. Crowds gathered at the station from the morning despite intense police patrolling.
People from areas such as Chandanagar, BHEL, Lingampally, Kukatpally, KPHB, and Moosapet came to Miyapur to witness the inauguration. Since they knew that PM was scheduled to make an appearance at the station, they waited there for hours, hoping to catch a glimpse of him.
Despite vehicular movement not having been restricted, people were seen running across the road and jumping over dividers and railings at the station. The police were rendered helpless as they were unprepared to handle such a large crowd. Usually, ropes are used to control and restrict the movement of people at such events, but no such arrangements were made at Miyapur.
Just before the Prime Minister’s arrival, the crowd was asked to move away from the entrance. Many people said that they had come to see Mr Modi. The police had to convince them that they would, in fact, not be able to catch a glimpse of him.
When Mr Modi arrived, he received huge cheers from the crowd. The entrance of station was covered, so the crowd was unable to witness the inauguration.
Nevertheless, people remained there until the ceremony was completed. They were quite content with waiving at the choppers of the PM and other VVIPs and waving at the metro train in which the PM travelled.
Traffic was blocked only for 15 minutes after the PM’s arrival as the traffic police had a tough time controlling the crowd.
Ramya Siddi, a 23-year-old student from Chandanagar, said, “Though we were not allowed to watch the inauguration from close by, standing a few hundred feet away from the Prime Minister was really exciting.”
Ramya and her friends kept themselves busy by waving to the choppers and taking selfies while they were at the station.
Sunil Kumar, a BPO employee from Kukatpally, said he was waiting for the Metro rail to be launched so that his daily travel woes would finally come to an end. Sunil has to travel from Kukatpally to Uppal every day.
“I am not going to wait to purchase the metro smart card. I have brought my daughter to show her the choppers and the crowd gathered here,” he said.
