Into its sixth day of dharna, the residents of Secunderabad Cantonment assembled at the Ambedkar statue in large numbers to show their support for the demand for the merger of Secunderabad Cantonment Board (SCB) with the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC). The dharna is spearheaded by Secunderabad Cantonment MLA Sri Ganesh Narayanan. Speaking to Metro India, he said, “I wish to make it abundantly clear that our demand is for the merger of civilian areas only as getting through approvals takes years.”

Citing an example, he explained- “It took one year to get an approval of Rs 10 crore for the development of Tirumalgherry Lake and the Rs 14 crore for a sports complex at Dhobighat and Rs 5 crore for Ramanakunta Lake development is pending for long. For every minute issue we also need to get a NoC from the SCB.” Since 2025 there is no election and SCB is run by a nominated post.

There are several anomalies, for instance the property registration tax, throughout Telangana State, the stamp duty is 7.5% but residents of the cantonment need to pay 11%. Development is taking a major hit as sanitation, health, water supply and providing basic necessities is difficult. The pending service charges from the Defence Ministry to SCB has amounted to 1,200 crore.

What is ironic is there is a sizable population of hut dwellers who have the voting rights for Assembly as well as Parliament elections but have no right to vote for SCB. This has resulted in not being eligible for several State Government schemes such as Indiramma housing.

We want the merger to happen before the Urban Local Body (ULB) elections, further delay would mean denying the 4.5 lakh residents their right to elect local representatives.