‘Illegal’ houses powerless
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Residents of about half-a- dozen colonies in the Kushaiguda area staged a day-long dharna in protest of being denied power connection for the last four years. The residents complained that despite appeals to the electricity department, their pleas have gone unheard.
Among the affected colonies are Sonia Gandhi Nagar, Subhodaya Colony, Cutting Colony, New Vasavi Nagar, where over 1,500 houses have remained without power connection even four years after construction.
“We have been doing the rounds of the electricity department as well as the municipality, but we haven’t received any convincing answer in all these years. All we could figure out was that our colony has been termed illegal and that there was some foul play involved in the matter,” said Lakshman Goud, a resident of Sonia Gandhi Nagar.
After five to six hours of the dharna and local politicians jumping in to resolve the issue, the divisional engineer of the area assured the 700 odd agitating locals that the colonies would be provided with electricity connection within 15 days.
“We had stopped giving connections to some of the slum areas in Cherlapally after we received a letter from the GHMC asking us to restrict fresh connections as the land had been allotted for a stadium,” said Karunakar Babu, divisional engineer (APCPDCL, Sainikpuri.
“Most of the residents are poor. Although the construction in the entire area was done four years ago, an MLA had written a letter to the concerned officials of the electricity department saying that power connections should not be given to these houses as they are illegal constructions. However, that aspect can only be decided by the concerned officials,” said BJP spokesperson N.V.S.S. Prabhakar.
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