TRICHY: Ten years after five wards in Thiruverumbur were added to Trichy corporation, residents are still awaiting the promised development of infrastructure while merging with the urban local body. Residents say that even during a moderate rain, roads in the added areas go swampy and offer a backbreaking journey.
Indeed, waste collection has improved and there was a surge in land value, but nothing else has changed for them, the residents in the added wards say.
Trichy corporation had previously witnessed an expansion in 2011. With the amalgamation of Thiruverumbur town panchayat and four village panchayats, namely Ellakudi, Alathur, Keelakalkandarkottai and Pappakurichi, five more wards (number 61 to 65) were added to the urban local body. With another round of expansion on cards with the addition of 25 village panchayats, residents of the added wards say they are yet to get their due. Localities comprising Amman Nagar, New town, Balaji Nagar and Kattur were the most to suffer as the residential roads dug up for underground drainage work were too difficult to commute.
Though underground drainage and drinking water projects are under way, residents said the projects could have been initiated and completed much before in the past decade. “Even the ongoing UGD work is too slow, cars and heavy vehicles are getting stuck during rain,” K Shyam Sundar, a resident of New town said. While the other corporation wards have several public parks in close proximity, the added wards are deprived of proper green space.
While solid waste management has improved for the better, the land value after the upgradation to corporation has increased too as commercial establishments have cropped up in Thiruverumbur. Drinking water supply is erratic in wards 65 and 63, forcing residents to rely on purified RO water. Poor infrastructure growth of the added wards has prompted the recently chosen panchayats to oppose the plan. “We will complete the UGD work by 2022. The added wards will get new roads as a part of Rs 40 crore road development work. The wards would not have got UGD if they were town or village panchayat,” a senior official with Trichy corporation said.
