Residents of Sopore locality rue lack of basic amenities

Sopore, Mar 7:  The residents of Sher Colony locality of Sopore in north Kashmir’s Baramulla district rued lack of basic amenities in the area and demanded attention of higher-ups in this regard.

Scores of residents said that their locality is completely ignored by the government, despite it being barely one and half kilometer away from main town Sopore. The locality lacks basic amenities of life, they said, adding that the locality consisting of 400 households is facing tremendous hardships due to poor drainage facility and dilapidated inner link roads in the area causing immense hardships to them.

“The area has been neglected by successive governments and nobody seems to be taking our issues seriously,” residents said.

Residents also alleged that they are reeling under hours of power cuts daily and despite repeated requests to the PDD, no attention is being given to their plight.

“We are facing hardships due to the pesky power cuts during day and night hours which makes our life miserable. If PDD is unable to provide uninterrupted scheduled power supply then they don’t have the right to charge us for electricity on the newly installed smart electricity meters,” Mushtaq Ahmad Dar, one of the local residents said.

The residents also complained of shortage of drinking water in the area for years. They said that due to inadequate water shortage they are forced to drink contaminated water from river jhelum which causes many water borne diseases, but nobody from the administration cares.

The residents further said that little rain causes water logging in the entire area and “we are unable to go outside from our houses especially our school going children”, which as per them, was the result of lack of drainage system in their locality.

They said that they have repeatedly brought these issues in notice of concerned higher ups several times but on ground nothing has been done.

Residents are suffering badly as local administration is least bothered about the worst condition of this low lying locality of town, which is putting lives of people in trouble, Farooq Ahmad Dar another resident said.

The residents appealed to the LG Manoj Sinha and district administration Baramulla to resolve their problems as soon as possible.