Around 10.30 p.m., the sound of the police siren begins at a distance near the suspension bridge on Durgam Cheruvu. “Aaa gaye ye log (these people have come),” says a man waiting for his cup of tea near the stretch of the road parallel to ITC Kohenur. As the patrol vehicle approaches, the makeshift shops close and hungry workers from the nearby areas disperse.
At the other end of the city, the bustling heart of Hyderabad at Charminar is also being shuttered much before 11 p.m. as part of the election code. “This is hurting our business. What do we do with the leftover food? A lot of workers are unable to find food after 11 p.m., so do our regular late-night clientele,” says Mohammed Majeed of Pista House. A student from Tarnaka says they used to get food delivered with one app or the other till 3 a.m.. “Now, we cannot get any food delivered after midnight.”
For businesses, it is a double whammy as the transport of the day’s collection has also run into problem due to the checks for cash by election and police officials.
