eNarada, Bengaluru, Wednesday, December 27, 2017
For the last 10 days, the residents of the first cross, Central Excise layout, Vijayanagar haven’t been able to step out of their homes literally! If you are wondering as to why these residents have become prisoners in their own homes, then blame it on the Congress-BJP war!
For the last decade or so, Vijayanagar has been a political battleground between Congress and BJP. The Congress party is represented by MLA M Krishnappa, now the minister, while the BJP was earlier represented by former minister V Somanna. During their peak of rivalry, clashes were quite common. However, now, though the senior leaders aren’t directly involved, it is the junior leaders who are making lives miserable for the residents.
The story goes thus; the storm water drain remodelling works were taken up at different places in Central excise layout. While a portion of the drains were being removed by the contractors affiliated to Congress leaders, the other portions were being done by BJP-supported contractors. The Congress workers took exception to this and tried to stop the BJP from doing work. As it was a Congress ruled constituency, the BJP contractors backed out. However, while backing out, they left the work half done (the slabs covering the drains were removed and there by residents couldn’t step out of their homes easily. Now, these drains have become ‘orphans’ as neither BJP nor Congress backed contractors are interested to speed up the work.
As debris occupied major space, Many residents have left their car in their friends or relatives homes.
While a few daring residents are trying to place stones, the senior citizens are forced to stay indoors. One of the senior citizens told eNarada that they are unable to step out of the house fearing falling into drain and hence their children (who are staying elsewhere) bring food for them daily!
When contacted, BBMP’s junior engineer too expressed helplessness in the party fight.
Speaking to eNarada, contractor Vijeth Gowda said he will try to complete the work here within two weeks as he has to first complete the work he has started in adjacent areas.
