Jail Khana tenants ready to take up restoration work

Monda Market: Years of apathy on the part of the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) to restore the Old Jail Khana has left the tenants in tight waters. Srinivas Malathker, General Secretary of the Old Jail Khana Tenants Association (OJKTA) says, “Enough is enough.

Tired of several representations to the authorities, the Old Jail Khana Tenants Association is now ready to restore the building on its own

We have given several representations to the authorities but now we are tired and spent. We want to take up restoration, lest the structure falls apart.”
Till date, the OJKTA has given 12 representations to several authorities including GHMC and HMDA.

The structure supports 100 families of big, small and petty shopkeepers in the area who have been maintaining it on their own. "As shopkeepers who have been renting the space in this building since 1942, we have a certain emotional attachment to this place. Hence, individually we are trying to keep the structure intact by getting it plastered with cement and whitewashing it on a regular basis.

But all this can only extend the building's life by 50 years. It needs to be renovated with lime mortar. Despite submitting 12 representations to several authorities including the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation and the Hyderabad Metropolitan Development Authority, no officials have the shown interest to conserve the building." shares Srinivas Malathker, General Secretary of the Old Jail Khana Tenants Association, which is currently working to upkeep the health of the historic edifice.

Converted into a commercial space in 1912, the former British prison has also been awarded the status of a Heritage Building by the erstwhile Andhra Pradesh government in 2006 yet no actions have been taken in order to protect its historical value.

Made of limestone and sand, the archaic construction still stands strong amongst the recent establishments in the area but due to poor maintenance by the state government, plastering from the ceilings and pillars have been peeling off from the past few years.
"Money is not an issue. We will raise funds for it. But since the building is a property of the government our hands are tied.

We have sent several requests over the same but the officials have simply turned a blind eye to the issue.

How can we let the Jail Khana bite dust when it has been feeding us for so many years?! It is unfortunate that a government which can spend crores in celebrating festivals is unable to allocate funds for what happens to be an important page in the history of India's freedom struggle." expresses Sandeep Mahendrakar, a 4th generation businessman whose family runs a textile store in the area.

Moreover, the association members also reveal that instead of arresting the issue by face-lifting the structure, officials of the GHMC along with the political leaders of the area have proposed for the reconstruction of a new building with multi-level parking in the place of the Old Jail Khana which has been vehemently opposed by the tenants of the building.

On enquiring, J Shankariah, GHMC Zonal Commissioner of North Zone said that no proposal has been put formally yet and that the talks about the issue are still going on at ministerial level.

Citing that there are people who've illegally sub-leased the spaces in the Jail Khana building, a close source in GHMC revealed that even the rent being paid is one-tenth the actual worth of the area occupied in the building which is one reason why officials are hesitant to take any action on the issue.