Hyderabad totally deserted - TeluguPeople.com News

HYDERABAD: In what is billed as the first exercise of its kind anywhere in the country, an intensive household survey is underway across Telangana state Tuesday to know social and economic status of nearly four crore people in a single day.

Nearly four lakh government employees are covering about one crore households in all 10 districts of the state including Hyderabad.

Brushing aside the criticism by opposition and allegations that it is aimed at singling out people from Andhra Pradesh living in Hyderabad, the Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) embarked on the massive exercise to collect data.

The government clarified that by collecting the information it wants to identify real beneficiaries of the welfare schemes and to weed out the bogus ones.

The survey began at 7 AM across the state with enumerators going door-to-door to gather information like names, age, educational qualification, profession, Adhar card numbers, bank account number, property and other details of the family members.

In Hyderabad, the survey is expected to continue till 8 PM As many as 75,000 government employees are gathering data of 20 lakh families in Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC).

Major Towns Deserted

The capital city and all towns in the state went totally deserted Tuesday with the state government declaring a holiday to enable people to remain at home and participate in the household survey.

The usually busy roads in Hyderabad were empty as public transport and even autorickshaws went off the roads. Government offices, educational institutions, shops, petrol bunks, hotels, cinema halls and all other business establishments were shutdown as the government warned the private institutions of action for violating holiday orders. It exempted only emergency services.

Many information technology companies, however, were open as their managements expressed inability to declare a holiday. The global IT/ITES companies said their employees can still get enumerated as they will be having different shifts.

As Hyderabad is a common capital of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, Andhra Pradesh legislature, whose budget session began Monday, functioned as usual. Employees of Andhra Pradesh secretariat and other offices also worked.

The government has ordered Road Transport Corporation (RTC) not to ply a single bus across the state. Autorickshaws also stayed off the roads. People reaching at railway stations faced inconvenience. However, private cabs operated as usual.

The roads in busy areas like Khairatabad, Panjagutta, Ameerpet, Dilsukhnagar, Koti, Abids, Mehdipatnam and L. B. Nagar were completely deserted. Residents have termed the situation unprecedented as even the shutdowns called by political parties never evoked such a total response.

Adding to this, thousands of families residing in Hyderabad headed to the native places in other parts of Telangana to participate in the survey. Even the patients in government-run hospitals took permission to visit their homes for the enumeration.

Normal life also came to a standstill in Karimnagar, Warangal, Nizamabad, Khammam, Nalgonda, Mahabubnagar, Adilabad, Medak and other towns in the state.

Telangana, Andhra CMs, Governor Enumerated

Officials collected details from Telangana Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao and his family members at his official residence in Begumpet. Some officials visited Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu's residence in Jubilee Hills. As Naidu and his family members were not at home, the enumerators gathered details from his secretary.

Survey a Huge Success, Claims Govt

Contrary to speculations in some circles that the survey is aimed at targeting people from Andhra Pradesh living in Hyderabad, the survey form has no nativity column. Even declaring bank account number is optional.

Irrigation Minister Harish Rao, who participated in the survey, said despite misinformation spread by the vested interests and opposition parties, the survey was a huge success with people voluntarily coming forward to participate in it.

"The government wants to know if there are families who need benefits like ration card, housing and pension. The database will help us to plan better and ensure that the benefits of the schemes reach the deserving," he said.

The TRS government said lack of credible data was a major hurdle in planning and implementation of welfare scheme as total number of ration cards exceed the number of households.

It alleged that huge irregularities were committed in the past in implantation of schemes like housing for poor, reimbursement of fee of poor students, free healthcare and social pensions.

Despite criticism, it went ahead with the survey in a single day to ensure that there is no duplication and bogus beneficiaries are removed.