A makeshift police booth on the Chennai–Bangalore Highway, near Poonamallee, provides a sense of location — with ‘Nazarathpet police check point’ hurriedly written on it.
Nazarathpet serves as a border post on the western side of Chennai. Its importance ends there.
As one walks through the dusty village of Nazarathpet, I cannot help note that it lacks significantly in civic infrastructure.
There are open drains. Only a few sodium vapour lamps illuminate the common areas of the village. The government buildings look dilapidated. A ration shop is bursting at its seams. Common hand pumps are inadequate and there is a hopeless dash for them. The overhead tanks leak. Many stretches are sandy.
“For education and healthcare, many of us travel to Poonamallee or Porur. Many residents of Nazarathpet work as labourers in the manufacturing units at Irungattukottai and Sriperumbudur,” said L. Ezhumalai, former president, Nazarathpet Village Panchayat.
Referring to the proposal to form three municipal corporations — Avadi in the west and Tambaram and Pallavaram in the south — a Tiruvallur district administration official said that when this became a reality, it would help villages and town panchayats that have been on the leeward side of development.
In Avadi, as many as 11 villages, which include Vangaram, Nazarathpet, Sennerkuppam, Alapakkam, Nemelicheri, Palavedu, Vellavedu, Surapet, Kuthambakkam and Padur, and three big municipalities, namely Avadi, Poonamallee and Thiruverukadu, and one town panchayat, Thirunindravur have been proposed to make up the Avadi municipal corporation. This would be the largest of the three proposed municipal corporations.
“All residents have a right to basic facilities. However, in reality, as a corporation is better placed in terms of funds, localities attached to one can hope to have better infrastructural facilities than those that are not — at least, technically,” said municipal official of Tiruvallur district administration.
Village and town panchayats stand to gain more if they are attached to a significant municipality, especially when it comes to access to technology pertaining to solid waste management, water supply, lighting, roads and health care and parks. The gains will be greater still when they come to be attached to a corporation.
At present, most of the villages around Avadi, Thiruverukadu and Poonamallee — the three big municipalities in the western section of the city — are considerably lacking in good roads, illumination, water supply, healthcare and spaces for entertainment. Buses are infrequent and police personnel are not posted in adequate numbers. Most of the funds generated by village panchayats are now spent on paying their staff, electricity bills and garbage collection.
