Hyderabad Goes Greater

The Andhra Pradesh government on Monday announced the merger of 12 municipalities within the limits of Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (MCH) and the constitution of Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC).

The municipalities that have been merged into GHMC include LB Nagar, Gaddiannaram, Uppal Kalan, Malkajigiri, Kapra, Alwal, Quthbullapur, Kukatpally, Serilingampalli, Rajendranagar, Ramachandrapuram and Patancheru.

With the merger, GHMC will now have a coverage of about 625.52 square kilometres with a population of about 67 lakh as compared with the earlier area of MCH, which has 172.6 sq km with a population of 45 lakh.

GHMC would be headed by a commissioner who will be a senior IAS officer. As the reorganisation of the administrative set up for the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation is likely to take some time and in order to ensure that there is no disruption and dislocation of civic functions, the state government has decided to redesignate the municipal commissioners of the 12 municipalities as deputy commissioners of GHMC.

As an interim measure, he said, the erstwhile areas falling within all the 12 municipalities would be treated as administrative zones and the deputy commissioners would be delegated with necessary powers to effectively look after the day-to-day civic functions in their respective zones.

Asserting that the state government would not increase the burden of taxes on the citizens of GHMC, the information minister said the new municipal corporation would continue with the old area-wise taxation system.

City-level systems like major road network, water supply, sewerage and drainage, urban transport and environment system, the minister said, cannot be done locally and need to be tackled in an integrated manner by an appropriate civic management structure.

Hence, the state government is implementing a Rs 28,000-crore master plan that include the Rs 5,000-crore 162-km outer ring road (ORR), a Rs 2,000-crore sewerage infrastructure plan and a Rs 500-crore elevated express highway, which are under various stages of development.