Telangana techies ride horses on Hyderabad's ISB road, finally catch govt's eye

They came on horses, and while they haven't exactly conquered the world, they have managed to make a big difference.

A group of Hyderabad techies rode horses on the city's busy ISB road last week to make a point: That the road was only fit for horses, not vehicles, thanks to the government's mindless repair work.

The techies were protesting against the whitetopping of the ISB road, which was causing inordinate delays and massive traffic jams for commuters. The roads in every other alternate route, meanwhile, are in terrible shape, only adding to the citizens' woes. 

In fact, the traffic piled up so much, that even one end of the Outer Ring Road (ORR) began witnessing slow-moving vehicles.

Finally, taking note of the horseback agitators' requests, the Telangana State Industrial Infrastructure Corporation (TSIIC) held a meeting on Wednesday, and promised to take up repair work of alternate routes in the area.

“Minister KT Rama Rao has made a special enquiry about what is causing the delay. He reassured the public about the need for the white topping that was being undertaken for future benefit of the traffic flow,” DCP Ashok of Traffic Wing was quoted as saying.  

The Times of India quotes TSIIC Managing Director E V Narasimha Reddy saying, “Considering the alternative routes being damaged, we will repair this at the earliest. White topping was proposed for the Financial District road, taking into consideration the future traffic volume that may use this road. Through these works, this road will become a model road equipped with ample infrastructure. Meanwhile, the road stretches that fall under alternate routes will be repaired by TSIIC."

The TOI report also quotes C Vinod Kumar, zonal manager (FAC) of TSIIC, saying, "Repair works at a few alternate routes such as the road stretches between Wipro junction and Nanakramguda, Q city and Goppanpaly and Mantri and Waverock, will be taken up first. The agency has also been advised to finish the work at the earliest. While the work was expected to be completed by Aug 21, this deadline has now been pushed to the end of October."

Activists alleged that the road was perfectly fine, and would not have needed repair works for at least two or three years, but claim that the government still went ahead, and dug it up.

"Just a couple of years ago, a footpath and central median was laid spending several crore rupees. Why this mindless act of more money down the drain is what we are asking. If the white topping was so important, there are so many roads full of potholes. Any one of them could have been taken up," Ramanjeet Singh, an IT professional, had earlier told NDTV.