Mudasir Tariq
Early Times Report
SRINAGAR, Feb 12: As the successive governments in the state have been sleeping on the issue of mushroom growth of slums in the summer capital, over the years several areas in the city have become dwelling places of slums. These slums have now turned into full-fledged colonies, proving a nuisance for the local residents.
A large number of non-local slum dwellers live at Padshahi Bagh, Mehjoor Nagar, Parimpora, Lasjan-Byepass, Barzulla and Bemina, proving delinquent for the locals who blame them for many social evils including alcoholism, drug addiction, robberies and communicable diseases.
"These people are highly exposed to infections, they live in polluted environment. They are involved in several anti-social activities that have adverse effects on the locals here. It is troublesome for the locals here to live near these people," said Ghulam Nabi Bhat, a resident of Parimpora.
While looking at the homes of these slum people, they live in polluted, garbage laden, and plastic thatched huts with satellite television dishes installed on most of them. Ironically not only thousands of square feet of the area have been encroached in the city, but several government apartments have also been held up illegally by slums.
"We asked the government several times to displace them but no one came to our rescue. They all have encroached to form a colony of their own. Now and then, we have had ugly quarrels with these people especially when we find them drunk and roaming around the streets," said Abdul Majeed, a resident of Padshahi Bagh.
Surprisingly, the slums also make illegal use of government facilities like water and electricity. These slums reportedly enjoy satellite television by illegal access to electricity using hooks, while they are not included on the Power Development Department (PDD) list; they illegally use electricity causing unnecessary load shedding.
"The transformer in our area has blown up multiple times particularly because of the unwanted load from these dwellers. Even though the slum looks shabby, these people have TV sets and modern electronic gadgets," said Iqbal Darzi, a local at Bemina.
Many people attribute that Srinagar Municipal Corporation (SMC) is providing a safe passage to these slums, as these slum people clean the garbage and dirt in return of meager amounts of money.
"Even after several complaints nothing has been done practically, the reason is simple, many times the SMC requires these people to clean the garbage when there is a dearth of man power, and this is the reason that there has been an upsurge in the number of these slums in the city," said Abdul Majid, a retired SMC employee. |
