Tag: Greater Noida Authority

‘Power Cuts Have Made Life Miserable For Gr Noida Citizens’

By LokMarg

Manish Kumar, a resident of Supertech Ecovillage 1 in Gr Noida, narrates the hardships of citizens amid rampant power outages in peak summer

While power outages in Uttar Pradesh are not uncommon, this summer has been one of the worst for the citizens. Social media is full of complaints and pictures of UP citizens suffering in sweltering heat or protesting before authorities. The residents of the high-rise apartments in satellite cities of Noida and Ghaziabad are perhaps among the worst affected.

I stay in one of the gated housing societies at Supertech Ecovillage 1 in Greater Noida and speak from my personal experience. The situation is made worse as frequent outages force residents to opt for back-up power at rates that are manifold the normal electricity tariff. Approximately, the Greater Noida citizens are facing a two to four hours of power cut every day.

Most of these societies are occupied by young professionals who are also first-time property buyers. These owners have just started their families and have young children at home. For the sake of their children’s comfort, they are forced to buy back-up power which burns a hole in their pocket. Power cuts mostly happen in the night time, costing precious sleep to these salaried workers.

Power outages also means the high-rise facilities like lifts or common area lights will be rationed. Thus, often only one elevator is functional for four-five blocks. Most upper floor residents can be spotted waiting for the lift endlessly. What will happen in case of any medical or fire emergency is anybody’s guess!

For each power cut, the apartment dwellers are forced to shell out four-five times of the state power tariff for the back-up supply. If we compare our monthly electricity bill to the neighbouring state of Delhi, we find ourselves being looted by the power distributing company and builders.

ALSO READ: ‘Traffic Mayhem In Greater Noida’

The reasons for this problem are multi-dimensional. Foremost are the builders who focussed on using every inch of space for housing units without spending much on quality and affordable power back-up systems. Another reason is climate-related. Rampant deforestation to build as many concrete structures as possible in the area led to further rise in temperature, raising the demand for power.

Then the power distribution companies which have not upgraded their equipment in proportion to the rise in population of the area. Therefore, when the power demand peaks, their generators cave in. Such a situation is not a power cut; but a local power failure or local fault. This is worse than an outage, for one knows not when the fault would be rectified and supply restored. In addition, some officials are hand in glove with builders who want to make an extra buck through selling back-up power, which costs around ₹20-25 per unit at most of the gated community housing blocks.

Such is the state of power supply when the occupancy in the region is much below its optimum. We see the situation only going downhill from here. We have protested against this many times but the authorities have turned a blind eye on the issue.

As told to Deepti Sharma

‘Gr Noida Authority Must Wake Up to the Traffic Terror In City’

By LokMarg

Abhishek Kumar, head of the Noida Extension Flat Owner’s Welfare Association (Nefowa), narrates the hardships of homebuyers in the locality to LokMarg

With over one lakh flats spread over 70 high-rise housing societies in the Greater Noida West, the road infrastructure is horribly inadequate in the locale. The narrow roads, unplanned traffic management and poor driving sense collectively lead to huge jams and loss of man-hours every day. On weekends, driving in this so-called posh locality becomes a traffic mayhem, no less.

Such is the case when the occupancy in these towering gated housing communities is 50 per cent. I dread to imagine the situation when there is near-full occupancy here in the near future; how burdened the current road infrastructure will then be!

The Greater Noida Authority, the state agency responsible for planning, developing and regulating the region, seems the least bothered about the grave situation on the horizon. If civic authorities do not wake up now, there will be anarchy on the Greater Noida roads in a couple of years from now.

I hold the authority responsible for they favoured greedy builders at the cost of accompanying infrastructure. I will give you a practical example: there are no service lanes in Gaur City One and Two, no parking areas; in case of Gaur City Two, there is not even a garden area. Is this the way for our town-planners to develop a modern township?

ALSO READ: ‘We, The Residents Of Pakistan Gully In Gr Noida’

The residents pay a heavy price for the authority’s apathy. The police are flooded with calls for help to unclog roads every day. But they can only help to an extent, they are themselves stressed with such a heavy volume of vehicular movement. Road users are also to blame. Wrong side driving is rampant, illegal parking is also a major issue and encroachments on these already narrow roads contribute to creating new bottlenecks.

Many builders of the housing societies have very narrow, single-lane entry-exit points. A single vehicle breakdown can lead to long queues of vehicles in less than ten minutes as the rush is heavy in peak hours. There have been cases when people get stuck outside their apartments for 40 minutes; if they could step out of their cars, they would reach home in five minutes. I plead: spare a thought for some medical emergency and an ambulance stuck in this choc-a-bloc!

The real reason for this daily disorder in several parts of Greater Noida is that the land is largely occupied by housing apartments or shopping malls; parking space, service lanes, breathing space etc. be damned. The town-planners only had real estate in mind, not public spaces such as educational institutions, medical facilities or green covers.

The area is developed only for the homebuyers who are now being left to fend for themselves. Go fight your own daily battle. The authority must take this issue seriously, as the homebuyers will not remain silent for long. Greater Noida residents have invested their lives’ savings to buy a comfortable living space, not spend their precious time on roadblocks.

As told to Deepti Sharma