Hyderabad totally deserted for survey

Hyderabad and all towns in Telangana went totally deserted Tuesday with the state government declaring a holiday to enable people to remain at home and participate in the household survey.

The usually busy roads in Hyderabad were empty as public transport and even autorickshaws went off the roads.

Government offices, educational institutions, shops, petrol bunks, hotels, cinema halls and all other business establishments were shutdown as the government warned the private institutions of action for violating holiday orders. It exempted only emergency services.

Many information technology companies, however, were open as their managements expressed inability to declare a holiday. The global IT/ITES companies said their employees can still get enumerated as they will be having different shifts.

Information Technology minister K. Tarakarama Rao said the government had no objection as long as the employees participate in the survey.

As Hyderabad is a common capital of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, Andhra Pradesh legislature, whose budget session began Monday, functioned as usual. Employees of Andhra Pradesh secretariat and other offices also worked.

The government has ordered Road Transport Corporation (RTC) not to ply a single bus across the state. Autorickshaws also stayed off the roads. People reaching at railway stations faced inconvenience. However, private cabs operated as usual.

The roads in busy areas like Khairatabad, Panjagutta, Ameerpet, Dilsukhnagar, Koti, Abids, Mehdipatnam and L. B. Nagar were completely deserted. Residents have termed the situation unprecedented as even the shutdowns called by political parties never evoked such a total response.

Adding to this, thousands of families residing in Hyderabad headed to the native places in other parts of Telangana to participate in the survey. Even the patients in government-run hospitals took permission to visit their homes for the enumeration.

Normal life also came to a standstill in Karimnagar, Warangal, Nizamabad, Khammam, Nalgonda, Mahabubnagar, Adilabad, Medak and other towns in the state.

Telangana survey kicks off