Unprecedented rains wreaked havoc in the capital city of Telangana, Hyderabad. As usual while success has many fathers, failure has none. Same is the case with the pathetic state of Hyderabad roads. KCR,Chandra Babu,Jagan along with all other sundry politicians boast that they kept Hyderabad on world radar with the development.
However when it comes to condition of roads, politicians disappear just like roads disappear with even a small drop of rain. Politicians ensure that VVIP roads are in good condition while others are left untouched for decades. Everyone knows the situation of roads in the interiors of Hyderabad and how nalas overflow and potholes pop out killing many.
GHMC workers come for dasara and other festival mamool but donot act when needed. Hyderabad witnessed its first ever traffic emergency on Friday evening when City Police Commissioner M. Mahender Reddy declared the traffic emergency and directed all police officials from the rank of Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP) to Inspector to come on road and participate in the traffic regulation duty.
His action came after rains lashed for the last once week. Hyderabad witnessed heavy traffic jams at over 100 traffic junctions. . The famous PV Narasimha Rao expressway has also witnessed heavy traffic jam on the entire stretch. It took almost one hour to travel a stretch of one km for the commuters. The city commuters was completely in shock as they took three to four hours to reach their homes.
People expressed anger as they got stuck in traffic jams and much to their shocks cab services Ola and Uber robbed and looted people with surge pricing. Ten minute drive from Punjagutta took three hours. Manoj Reddy sharing is ordeal said . “I got stuck in the maze at around 4.30 pm. Till 6.30 pm there was absolutely no movement. Even when it started to ease up, vehicles managed to move only at snail's pace. It was extremely painful,“
Travel from secretariat to IMAX took VK.Srivastava two and half hours and ambulance is not an exception.. He said “Hoping to escape the jam, many motorists in their to own wisdom started jumping on the wrong lane. This further aggravated the situation and slowed down the flow of traffic. Even an ambulance got stuck because of this,“
Another motorist said “I realised the cops were using the junction as a holding area (stop ping vehicles for considerable time) because allowing too many vehicles to pass through the circle at one time would result in jams along the stretches ahead. Commuters travelling from Tank Bund towards Khairatabad junction had to wait the longest as the latter was one of the worst affected by traffic snarls,“ Many blasted Hyderabad cops for the inept handling of the situation.
Vinod Kumar tweeted “India's worst traffic police in Hyderabad.Struck at Tank Bund, no traffic movement since three hours. Please help me.“ Srikanth tweeted “people are stuck inside RTC buses and kids inside them are crying due to hunger.“ To the top of it surge pricing by Ola and Uber added to the woes of the citizens.
Employee of a private infrastructure company, P.Karthik said . “I wanted to get a cab from Somajiguda to Kukatpally, and without showing any kind of surge upfront, cabs were charging Rs 510 (for share). It was not just today, even during rains two days ago, I was charged an astounding Rs 1, 500 for a ride,“ . Harika of Balanagar says “While I booked a Uber cab from Sarband Nagar to Chintal in a pool car, I was shocked to see that the price was Rs 250, whereas Ola's estimate was Rs 84, which is the usual price.Due to rains and Ganesh nimajjanam, these cab services are making more money and fooling people. The government should take action against them,“
Some cabs after booking started cancelling the trip.s Asmita Dasgupta tweeted angrily “#Uber & #ola services in #Hyderabad sucks.6 cancellations. Drivers keep on cancelling. Late to work for 2 hours. #disappointed & #annoyed (sic),“ Another passenger tweeted “Heavy rain Hyderabad. Uber tells me it costs me 660 bucks from Hi-tech City to home 14 km away . Wow!!“
Vishali who opted to stay at house shared “The regular prices have gone up two to three times. I decided it would be better to work from home than travel through the serpentine traffic jams, spend hours on roads, pay up three times the fare and still reach late and get a warning from the supervisor.“ In the meantime roads disappeared turning all lanes and bylanes in the city into virtual lakes.
