Vijayawada: Once a slum, Ajit Singh Nagar now teems with middleclass

Vijayawada: Ajit Singh Nagar Colony, once considered as slum area, has a gradual transformation into a middleclass colony and one of the biggest colonies in Vijayawada city.

The colony was developed with infrastructure facilities over the past 50 years.

More than 40,000 people live in Singh Nagar Colony, which is located within the Central Assembly constituency limits. Infrastructure facilities like CC roads, side drains, UGD, indoor and outdoor municipal corporation stadium, drinking water overhead tanks, water supply pipelines, municipal corporation schools and parks have been developed in a phased manner.

Once Singh Nagar termed as slum area as large number of poor people and slum dwellers were given house sites in the colony in 1960s and they settled in the colony in a phased manner. Installation of pipelines and construction of flyover transformed the colony from slum to middleclass area and a large number of people from different parts of the city started purchasing houses and house sites in Ajit Singh Nagar. Construction of apartments also gradually started and new small colonies gradually emerged.

With more residents coming in, demand raised for construction of CC roads and laying UGD, construction of water tanks, laying pipelines, side drains etc.

The major problems the residents faced during the early days was lack of basic needs and dumping yard and due to the foul smell, residents were unable to breathe freely. The colony people waged a prolonged struggle demanding shifting of the dumping yard from the colony. They complained of health hazards due to mosquito menace caused by the garbage.

Leaders of Left parties and other mainstream political parties also lend their voice to the fight of the residents for three decades to get rid from the garbage menace.

Thanks to Vijayawada Municipal Corporation. The VMC entered MoU with Tamil Nadu-based company and implemented bio-mining, which shifted the thousands of tons of garbage from the dumping yard to other location during the last three years. More than 90 percent of garbage was cleared and efforts were on to remove the remaining trash. With this, there are plans of constructing the biggest park in the city in 10 acres at a cost of Rs 10 crore.

Now, the residents of Ajit Singh Nagar colony were demanding for setting up a mini bus station and for construction of a second flyover along with the existing one, which was constructed nearly 25 years ago.

CPM leader Chigurupati Babu, who waged a prolonged struggle for the infrastructure development in Ajit Singh Nagar area, said Singh Nagar is one of the biggest colonies in the city and achieved rapid progress in the last three decades. He said UGD works are pending in some areas and connections are yet to be given. He underlined the need to develop the walking track in the Makineni Basava Purnaiah Municipal Corporation stadium and to develop housing colonies in open sites.

Former Municipal Commissioner Ajit Singh designed a master plan with roads and spaces for schools, parks and other facilities.

Singh Nagar started receiving Krishna water after late 1990s. Before that, the residents used to depend on bore water.

Central MLA and YSRCP leader Malladi Vishnu said efforts were on to develop Singh Nagar area and for setting up of mini bus station to make travelling easy for the residents.