Secunderabad: Serious concerns over road closures by Local Military Authority

Secunderabad: With the surge in Covid cases in the city, the Local Military Authority (LMA) has once again announced the closure of the road in the military establishment of Bolarum and Trimulgherry form 6 am to 11 pm from July 18 to 28. This has drawn, expectedly, strong displeasure of the Federation of North-Eastern Colonies (FNECS), which kicked off a campaign against the move.

"This arbitrary decision will affect over 15% of the population residing in the northeastern areas of the city. It is illogical to try to stop the spread of the pandemic by closing public roads which are used by thousands of citizens.

Many roads in the Bolarum and Yapral area that come under SCB limits have been already closed since March 23 without notification, causing tremendous distress to commuters and locals who travel from Kowkoor to Marredpally route. Residents had been forced to take long detours at a time when public transport is not available.

One can also imagine the tremendous tragedies that can occur during medical emergencies if further roads are blocked instead of reopening the already closed roads. We hope better counsel will prevail and LMA will withdraw the notice to close further roads and will reopen the already closed roads," said S Chandrasekhar, Secretary of the Federation of North-Eastern Colonies of Secunderabad (FNECS).

The local army gave a notice that they will shut the entire Secunderabad road. This is done illegally without following the due procedures prescribed by the Secunderabad Cantonment Board (SCB), as any closure of the roads has to be approved by the SCB, not by the LMA, under Section 258 of Cantonment Act 2006.

In spite of the Ministry of Defence instructing to open the road in 2018, the orders were not followed. Road closure would not reduce the cases of corona in the city, it is baseless, said Janardhan, a resident of one of the colonies.

If the road closure is the only solution to stop the spread of Covid, then all the roads should be closed and everyone should stay indoors. Earlier LMA in the name of security measures closed the roads and this is the second time they have taken this decision of road closure in the name of Covid. This would affect daily commuter of northeastern colonies," observed Venkat Ramana, another resident.