Cable television, telecom and Internet service providers have finally fallen in line with the GHMC diktat of taking their respective cables underground through a common duct. Work has commenced on four roads on a pilot basis for 20 ducts to be bunched together, announced Mayor Majid Hussain and GHMC Commissioner M.T. Krishna Babu on Wednesday.
Legal, technical and financial modalities of the project as well as maintenance issues are to be thrashed by the consortia of service providers at a meeting presided over by the Engineering-in-Chief R. Dhan Singh. For the first time, lease charges per kilometre too have to be paid.
Twenty ducts are to be laid adjacent to the footpaths five to six-foot deep. Sixteen ducts would be sufficient for the present capacity while four empty ones would become the property of the municipal corporation to be given on lease to any new service providers, explained Mr. Krishna Babu at the press conference.
Ducts are to be laid on the roads of Basheerbagh-Legislative Assembly-S.R.Nagar, NFCL-Road No.1 Banjara Hills-Masab Tank-S.D.Eye Hospital, Hotel Taj Krishna – KCP junction and Indira Park-RTC Crossroads-Ramnagar to begin with. Soon it would be taken to the 120-km roads identified for city beautification for the international bio-diversity meet to be held at Hitex in October.
“We are determined to see that the city is freed of the ugly hanging cables fully in the next two years,” exclaimed Mr. Majid Hussain. Hanging wires would be cut off by the service operators themselves junction to junction as the work progresses. Simultaneously, the municipal corporation would not allow any kind of road cutting to happen on these roads, said the Commissioner.
GHMC will function as the single window for taking permissions for laying ducts on all roads even those belonging to Roads & Buildings or National Highway Authority of India (NHAI). “Criminal action will be initiated against State heads of the service providers if road cutting is done illegally,” he warned. APCPDCL and HMWSSB engineers were requested to assist the duct work and tackle situations when their respective lines come in the way.
