Shoddy work on Charminar pedestrian project

Race against time

The CPP work finally took off after almost 15 years. The foundation for the Rs 479.86-crore CPP to provide streetscaping of old city from Madina to Patharghatti, granite pavement from Sardar Mahal to Charminar and also from Charminar to Gulzar House, was laid in December 2010 with much fanfare.

However, some people like former IAS officer Narendra Luther believe the implementation agency Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) might fail to recreate the age-old magic by deviating from the original plan.

In an effort to complete the pavement work from Madina to Charminar by July, the GHMC has adopted some quick fix techniques which fail to blend into the Nizami ambience around Charminar.

For instance, dull grey granite pavements were replaced by easily available multi-coloured tiles. The GHMC has also unloaded tons of interlocking tiles generally used for pavement works elsewhere in twin cities.

As per the master-plan, the complete pedestrianisation work must have been done with the help of specially made slabs that gel into the environment surrounding Charminar, Mecca Masjid and the lad bazaar.

Digging work on all the roads leading to Charminar has now been virtually halted from the last two and half months. Work on Gulzar House road is as per the project but it has also left big, deep pits everywhere on the roads.

As the work is left unfinished, locals, traders and small businessmen doing business on footpaths, face problems daily. Stones dumped for flooring and the piles of excavated soil are scattered all over the road making it hard for commuters to even walk.

The work is also delayed due to political interferences leading to bottlenecks. The proposal of the GHMC and the traffic police to temporarily close the road from Gulzar House to Charminar for vehicular traffic ran into trouble with political parties taking sides.