RWAs pitch for bringing all roads in SCB under GHMC

Hyderabad: A few NGOs and Residential Welfare Associations have submitted a representation to an eight- member committee that was recently constituted by the Ministry of Defence (MoD) and demanded to bring all public roads, whether classed A1 or C, under the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) limits.

Locals pointed out that all public roads in the Secunderabad Cantonment area should be brought under GHMC's jurisdiction. This should happen not only to roads that are presently under Cantonment Board but also to the roads presently under the Military Engineer Services (MES) (A1 class land), because most of the roads closed at present are A1 roads.

"As recently, MoD notice on color-coded maps concerning five different categories of Cantonment areas have given us new hope that civilian areas will be merged with GHMC, once the civilian areas of Cantonment are merged with GHMC, the remaining areas (A1) may get converted into Military Stations, and that main concern is that what will then happen to the roads passing through these areas. The road is meant for the public for commuting for smooth thoroughfare, so there should be no discrimination on them, it will be better if the committee takes a decision on bringing all the public roads in GHMC limits," said Sanki Ravinder, a member of Cantonment Vikas Manch.

"That roads over which the public had the right of way were streets under the Cantonments Act 2006. As per section 258 of the Act, only the Cantonment Board could close streets. Therefore, military authorities' unilateral and arbitrary closure of such roads was illegal. Of the 21 roads closed by the local military authority (LMA), few roads were classed as A1, and survey numbers assigned were different from adjoining land parcels. These roads were therefore acknowledged to be roads on which the public had the right of way. The remaining closed roads were listed as C category-under the Cantonment Board-and were roads on which the public had right of way, said C S Chandrashekar, secretary of the Federation of North Eastern Colonies of Secunderabad (FNECS).

Since the ongoing merger exercise contemplates merging civilian areas of Cantonment with GHMC, and since public roads are meant for civilian use, we, the locals of the northeastern part of Secunderabad, demand that all public roads which pass through Secunderabad Cantonment (that is, those roads recorded in the General Land Register as either A1 or C, should be brought under GHMC jurisdiction as and when the merger of civilian areas with GHMC takes place, that all such public roads be reopened to all traffic, and that these roads be improved to the same modern standards as are seen in the rest of the city, he added.