Vandalised Love Hyd monument moved from Tank Bund just a year after it was installed

Less than a year after it was installed, the "Love Hyderabad" typographic structure which was installed at Tank Bund in the city is being shifted. 

Officials of the Hyderabad Metropolitan Development Authority (HMDA) swung into action on Friday, and said that it would be repainted, and shifted to the People’s Plaza.

While some reports suggested that it was being shifted as it posed a security threat with people climbing on top of it, others suggested that it had become a traffic nightmare.

This move also comes as the city is gearing up for the Global Entrepreneurship Summit (GES), which will be attended by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and United States President Donald Trump's daughter and White House advisor Ivanka Trump.

While authorities have provided parking spots along the road, several two-wheelers would be seen stopping their vehicles, to take selfies with the structure, which caused traffic to pile up on the arterial road. 

The structure was inaugurated by Telangana IT minister KT Rama Rao, in the presence of Hyderabad Mayor Bonthu Rammohan and other officials in November last year.

“We want to make Tank Bund beautiful and a place for amusement and recreation for the people. HMDA and GHMC will work together to beautify the city and increase the tourist spots in Hyderabad,” KTR said at the time.

As part of the St+art Festival, around 20 artists had gathered in the city, and painted entire buildings and public walls, in a bid to promote street art. 

The festival brought together 9 Indian and international artists and 10 local artists from Telangana, to reinvent public spaces, following which this monument was designed and installed.  

The monument was erected to beautify Hyderabad and to offer a recreational facility for people, but within a week, it began getting vandalised.

While some visitors scribbled "love" messages on the structure and defaced it, others climbed on the structure, leave behind their dirty footprints.

“Visitors clicking pictures climb on the structure and make it dirty, but if you tell them to move, they abuse us. Mostly youngsters come after midnight in groups and don’t listen to any of the security guards and create problems for us,” a guard had told TNM earlier.