Part of stone railing of 445-year-old Puranapul razed for road widening
The Hindu
A section of the 445-year-old bridge on the River Musi has been damaged as part of the road widening project to ease traffic flow
A section of the 445-year-old bridge on the River Musi has been damaged as part of the road widening project to ease traffic flow. The broken fragments of the stone railing of the Puranapul have been carted away by civic officials on Monday night as hawkers in the area protested the move. A police outpost, and a public toilet have also been razed as part of the road widening move. “Commuters are showing us thumbs up and well-done sign while passing on this stretch. Traffic has eased by 60%. Once the six poles including the traffic signal are moved, there will be no bottlenecks in this area,” said a traffic police official manning the junction where five roads merge. Traffic flowing from the High Court side has an easier left turn at the junction, considerably easing movement of vehicles.
“We protested but they used the earthmover to pull it down. I can understand they want to widen the road as there is increase in traffic. But why here? Why not on the other side? This is an old bridge. See the mark on the stone railing. They plan to demolish that also,” says Mohammed Sarvar, whose pavement shop selling flowers and coconuts is now history.
“The shop was started by my father. I don’t know what to do,” says Mohammed Jeelani who hawked ginger and garlic on the pavement of the bridge.
“This is not the end. They will come back for more. I am afraid to go home in the night,” says Rajender who has been selling vegetables and flowers on the bridge since it was deemed unsafe for traffic and a new parallel bridge called Quli Qutb Shah Bridge was inaugurated in 1992. The old bridge built in 1578 during the reign of Ibrahim Qutb Shah underwent major repairs after the devastating floods of 1820 and 1908. While originally the bridge had 22 arches, some of the arches have been filled up as the flow of the river has declined after two dams were built upstream as flood control measures.