HYDERABAD: A city-based child rights NGO has accused Jubilee Hills MLA Maganti Gopinath of obstructing the construction of a rehabilitation and medical centre for blind, deaf and dumb children on the premises of the Women and Child Welfare Department at Vengal Rao Nagar.
The NGO, Balala Hakkula Sangham (BHS), has also accused the MLA of trying to take over the land in the pretext of laying a road in Madhura Nagar, that already has 20 approach roads.However, when Express contacted both the department officials and the MLA, they dismissed the allegations and called them baseless.Rehab and medical centre works will resume on Monday, they said.
BHS honorary president Achyuta Rao, while strongly condemning the alleged act of the legislator, asked him not to obstruct the ongoing works. “If he continues to do so, we will approach Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao and urge him to take action against the MLA,” he said.
When contacted, the Jubilee Hills MLA said that the allegations made against him were baseless and were aimed to tarnish his image by the opposition party leaders and the BHS.
“If the allegations against me are proved in a court of law, I will resign from my MLA post,” he said.
He said that the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) had approved a proposal to lay a road in Madhura Nagar near the department premises, where a small portion of land (150 sq yd) needed to be acquired.
He said he asked the department authorities to leave a small portion of the earmarked land for laying of road and go ahead with the other works. But the officials, without heeding to his request, began the rehab construction works without any valid building permission from the GHMC. “When I asked them to show the permission, they failed. I will sort out the issue with the department officials tomorrow,” the MLA said.
Medical and Health Department executive engineer, Chalapathi Rao said that the works were not halted.
“They will resume on Monday as usual. There are no issues with the MLA nor with the locals,” he said.
Contractor Harshavardhan Reddy said that four local people came to the site to stall the works and sought to know if there is a building permission, to which he said that he was not aware about the permission, and that he was not aware about the alleged involvement of any local MLAs. We will resume work tomorrow, he said.