Chief Minister N. Kiran Kumar Reddy will celebrate completion of two years in office by launching the girder for placing segments forming the metro rail viaduct at Uppal and also a stone commemorating the project on Sunday.
While the piers work has begun at three sections at Nagole-Mettuguda, Miyapur-JNTU and soon at L.B. Nagar pertaining to Line One (L.B. Nagar – Miyapur) and Line Three (Nagole-Raidurg), work on Line Two (Jubilee Bus Station – Falaknuma) has been restricted to soil testing only.
It is not just because of land acquisition issues on the Sultan Bazar-Badechowdi stretch as the government should also decide whether the metro line will pass through the originally envisaged route or make an alignment change as suggested by the Majlis-E-Ittehadul Muslimeen (MIM).
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Top metro rail officials have been stating that the file was with the Chief Minister for a decision on an alignment change. The original route was to take the elevated metro line towards Darulshifa after crossing the Mahatma Gandhi Bus Station (MGBS), Imliban.
From there the elevated line will pass through Purani Haveli, Moghalpura and Shah Ali Banda before reaching Falaknuma. The MIM represented that the line could be changed on crossing MGBS. It could be built opposite the Salar Jung Museum, Maternity Hospital, High Court, City College and alongside Musi River, Nehru Zoological Park, Idgah, Aliabad reservoir, Kalapather police station and Shamsher Gunj before reaching Falaknuma.
The party said that the changed route would avoid four mosques, four dargahs, two Ashur Khanas and two temples even if the metro rail authorities have been asserting that “no heritage or religious structure” was an obstruction for any of the three routes.
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“A few structures are in the way only because of the need to do road widening to ensure smooth traffic flow during construction. But, we can avoid major land acquisition if there is an alignment change,” officials say. Such a change also entails extension of Line Two by three km from 14.78 km to 17.78 km and a cost escalation by Rs.500 crore.
L&T Metro Rail Hyderabad (L&TMRH), however, has affirmed that it was going ahead as per the original alignment as it had not received any word about any change whatsoever.