HYDERABAD: Durgam Cheruvu is going to get a grand facelift in the coming week. But, all is not well lament citizens living on the banks of the lake that inundated surrounding colonies last year after heavy rains. Reason: The 3 metre-wide storm water drain has shrunk to barely 1 metre by the time it reaches the lake. Even GHMC officials are worried about the consequences.
“The catchment area of the Durgam cheruvu is about 30-40 acres and starts from Road No. 36 in Jubilee hills. Here, the drain is 3-metre wide. However, when it reaches Hitec Metro Station, it shrinks to just 1 metre. So water naturally leaks out,” said GHMC executive engineer Sudarshan. This has left many areas —like Kavuri Hills Phase 2, Doctor’s Colony and Nectar Gardens— inundated with water stagnating up to 3 feet.
A good chunk of the IT workforce of the city stays in the hostels and PGs that line Kavuri Hills area. This is the locality that gets hit first when it rains heavily. Water starts stagnating just 500 metres off the main road. “Our PG was surrounded by water last October, when it rained heavily,” recalls IT professional Diganta Bhaduri. Doctor’s Colony, a plush neighbourhood, is next in line that gets hit. Being a low-lying area, storm water accumulates here easily.
The colony people have come up with a ‘solution’ that is actually likely to aggravate the problem -- to build a wall to stop the water flowing from Kavuri Hills.
“All the water from upstream comes here, and now the wall will cut it off. When it rains it still floods, but our drains can handle that. At least not all water from the surroundings is coming here,” said a worker at the colony. The real problem due to the wall, however, is for people living in Kavuri Hills. The construction has aggravated flooding in their area.
Further downstream is Nectar Gardens which is adjacent to the newly renovated Durgam Cheruvu walkway entrance. With a wider drain being fixed right outside the colony recently, there is still no respite claim colony dwellers. “The drain’s opening is 6 holes, literally 6 holes can’t absorb any runoff,” said the guards at the colony.
The citizens living there are affected with roads adjacent to the lake bed filling up. “It was a nightmare, those few days of rain. The stretch of Road no. 45 beside the walkway entrance was filled with water up to 4 feet,” recounts Srikanth Venkataraman, a techie.