Low-cost house proves too costly

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Follow us:WhatsappFacebookTwitterTelegram.cls-1{fill:#4d4d4d;}.cls-2{fill:#fff;}Google NewsRamzan began on a sad note for Mohammed Pasha. The auto driver woke up early Saturday, the first day of the holy month, to offer the early morning namaaz at the nearby mosque in Adityanagar, near Miyapur in Hyderabad.As he bid goodbye to his half-asleep wife, Pasha did not have the slightest inkling that he was leaving a house on its last legs. Minutes after he left, the walls collapsed on his wife and their three children. A neighbour rushed to Pasha at the masjid. The man ran all the way back only to see neighbours pull out four limp bodies from the rubble. Pasha had bought the house at Adityanagar a few years ago. It didn’t look sound even then, having been built of bricks and clay with corrugated cement roofing thrown over it.For Rs 2 lakh that was all he would get, he though. The layout was fishy and the site itself was disputed. “The whole area gets flooded every rainy season. The walls gave in as they were built with bricks and mud,’’ said Yakub, a friend of Pasha.Pasha’s tragedy may be a forewarning for his neighbours. As many as 300 families live in the locality and all their houses are built with brick and mud.There are roads serving the disputed land but it would have helped more had the GHMC built a system of drains leading away from the locality. But the site being disputed, and subject of litigation in the court, the GHMC felt it had basis not to do much about the flooding. Pasha’s friend Yakub is angry nevertheless. Indeed the houses didn’t have GHMC clearance, but then lives are lives, he said.The other tragedy of Saturday morning too seemed avoidable -- and inevitable in the context of what is commonplace in Hyderabad. To the group of migrant labourers from Madhya Pradesh, the compound wall of ICI company in the industrial area of Balanagar seemed a safe place to build their huts against.They sold raincoats and woolens on the footpaths of the road outside and ducked into the huts at nightfall. But the downpour was callous.first published:January 01, 1970, 05:30 ISTlast updated:January 01, 1970, 05:30 IST
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Ramzan began on a sad note for Mohammed Pasha. The auto driver woke up early Saturday, the first day of the holy month, to offer the early morning namaaz at the nearby mosque in Adityanagar, near Miyapur in Hyderabad.

As he bid goodbye to his half-asleep wife, Pasha did not have the slightest inkling that he was leaving a house on its last legs. Minutes after he left, the walls collapsed on his wife and their three children. A neighbour rushed to Pasha at the masjid. The man ran all the way back only to see neighbours pull out four limp bodies from the rubble. Pasha had bought the house at Adityanagar a few years ago. It didn’t look sound even then, having been built of bricks and clay with corrugated cement roofing thrown over it.

For Rs 2 lakh that was all he would get, he though. The layout was fishy and the site itself was disputed. “The whole area gets flooded every rainy season. The walls gave in as they were built with bricks and mud,’’ said Yakub, a friend of Pasha.

Pasha’s tragedy may be a forewarning for his neighbours. As many as 300 families live in the locality and all their houses are built with brick and mud.

There are roads serving the disputed land but it would have helped more had the GHMC built a system of drains leading away from the locality. But the site being disputed, and subject of litigation in the court, the GHMC felt it had basis not to do much about the flooding. Pasha’s friend Yakub is angry nevertheless. Indeed the houses didn’t have GHMC clearance, but then lives are lives, he said.

The other tragedy of Saturday morning too seemed avoidable -- and inevitable in the context of what is commonplace in Hyderabad. To the group of migrant labourers from Madhya Pradesh, the compound wall of ICI company in the industrial area of Balanagar seemed a safe place to build their huts against.

They sold raincoats and woolens on the footpaths of the road outside and ducked into the huts at nightfall. But the downpour was callous.