Restrain Army: KTR to Rajnath Singh

Hyderabad: Municipal Administration Minister KT Rama Rao on Thursday urged the Union Defence Minister Rajnath Singh to give necessary instructions to the Local Military Authorities (LMA) of Secunderabad Cantonment Board (SCB) for restraint in unauthorized blockage of roads.

Rama Rao has written a series of letters to the Union Defence Ministry requesting their intervention in resolving the long-pending issue. He said that the closure of AOC roads by the Local Military Authorities of SCB was affecting millions of citizens daily, dwelling in north and north-eastern parts of Hyderabad City. "In an arbitrary and unauthorized manner, the Local Authorities are frequently resorting to the closure of these roads, resulting in untold misery to large sections of people as they have to take detours to commute daily," he said.

The Minister said that in July 2020, the Military Authorities LMA shut down four important roads - Allahabad Gate, Gough Road, Wellington Road, and Ordinance Road citing a surge in COVID19 cases. "It is distressing to note these roads are closed often for reasons bordering on frivolity. The state had taken up all required necessary measures to contain Covid including lockdown in May/June and seeing the improvement, the lockdown was eased and, surprisingly, roads are now closed for aforesaid reasons," said KTR.

The minister said that as far as the High Court order of September 26, 2014 was concerned, the State Government requested the Defence Ministry to hand over 42.2 acres of land for the purpose duly waiving the cost of land for transfer, the license fee for elevated portion and also a waiver of property compensations. The same was discussed in the last video conference held on April 20, convened by the secretary MoD and was agreed upon by the Centre. "We are awaiting instructions on this. By blatantly defying all SOPs, guidelines, and instruction of MoD, the continued closure of roads and in fact, LMA adding more roads to such closures is regretful, and disappointing. Apart from it leading to innumerable sufferings to millions of people, the LMA is almost disobeying and neglecting its own SOP and guidelines," said KTR.

The Minister requested the Union Defence Ministry to pass necessary instructions to the LMA to immediately open all these roads and further restrain them from taking any unilateral and arbitrary decision for closure of any of the Public Roads without following the due process, as contemplated under Section 258 of Cantonment Act 2006.