HYDERABAD: Those who wanted to make a splash in the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation ‘s (GHMC) swimming pools to beat the heat are a disappointed lot these days. Though the sweltering summer is already halfway through, none of the swimming pools are ready as they either have gone defunct or are in immediate need of repairs.
Every day hundreds of youth and parents of children are visiting swimming pools only to be greeted by closed doors and unhelpful staff. They do not give them any information as to when the pools would be back to normal. With a dead-pan expression on their faces, they tell them curtly that the swimming pool is being repaired.
The negligence of the civic body staff in keeping the swimming pools ready ahead of summer has in fact made the GHMC lose `1.5 crore to `2 crore by way of registrations. The swimming pools have remained closed during the last two years on account of the Covid-19 pandemic. Making hay while the sun still shone, private swimming pools are making a fast buck, capitalising on the rising demand from the youth for a facility to cool off. “I am going to the Vijayanagar Colony swimming pool frequently to know when it is going to be opened. The staff tell me that it would be opened soon but would not say when. March and April months have gone by and now we are in the middle of May. Till now the pool is not ready,’’ Krishna Kumar, resident of Masab Tank said.
“We are regularly going to the Ameerpet swimming pool for the last one month to find out when it would be opened. The staff say that some chemicals are needed to clean the pool,” Rambabu of Balkampet said. The staff working in various swimming pools told Express that there are about 50 to 75 such enquiries every day. “Some people are using abusive language to vent their anger at us for the delay in opening the swimming pools. Senior officials have to decide when to open the swimming pools,” the staff at the
pools said.
The 11 swimming pools include Secunderabad, Ameerpet, Vijayanagar Colony, Amberpet, Sanathnagar, Sachivalaya Nagar in LB Nagar, Moghalpura and Chandulal Baradari. Three Baby swimming pools are there at Amberpet, Moghalpura, and Chandulal Baradari.
GHMC officials said that they could not open the pools in summer owing to minor repairs like filtration plants and civic repairs. At some pools one can find sprouting of algal weeds, making water greenish in colour. The pools were closed for over two years because of the Covid-19 and now the staff are carrying out the repair works. By the time they are ready, summer would have passed and the rainy season would have set in. But by then demand would have gone down.