The residents of AT Agraharam in Guntur city are suffering due to the delay in completion of the road-widening works undertaken by the municipal corporation. The existing road is being widened to 80 feet to facilitate free movement of traffic.
Though the works began about a year back, they are going on at a snail’s pace, and legal disputes are being cited as a major reason for the delay.
Meanwhile, sewage and stormwater are overflowing on the road causing inconvenience to the residents and the other road users.
Mayor Kavati Manohar Naidu said the road-widening works were taken up from Chuttugunta Centre to Zero Line of AT Agraharam as per the Master Plan. Thirty-one private property owners on the road approached the High Court, disputing the widening works. The GMC officials are negotiating with them, as per the interim orders of the court, Mr. Naidu said, and hoped that the works would be completed as soon as possible.
The GMC officials identified 210 properties for removal for the road works, out of which 153 are private properties, 23 B-Form properties, 19 Urban Land Ceiling (ULC) properties, 12 encroachments, one temple and two other properties.
So far, the GMC paid ₹4.38 crore as compensation to 107 property owners and informed 72 to surrender their properties through a registered gift deed for issuing Transferable Development Rights (TDR) bonds. Twenty-one of them surrendered their properties for TDR bonds, which are being issued online.
