Healthcare is a casualty City Ballot Problems

Healthcare is a casualty City Ballot Problems

Anil Kumar Sastry
‘For major diseases, we have to go to K.C. General Hospital’
— Photo: K. Murali Kumar

Arduous: Residents of Narasimhaswamy Badavane in Laggere, Bangalore, have to spend at least three hours fetching water every day.
BANGALORE: A city which has won accolades as a medical tourism hub promising affordable healthcare to outsiders has conveniently forgotten to provide even basic healthcare facilities to its own denizens. Many areas still do not have a general hospital and Rajarajeshwari Nagar Assembly constituency is a classic example for the official apathy.

“For any major treatment, we have to go all the way to K.C. General Hospital at Malleswaram, which is 15 km away,” said M. Sriram, an electric shop owner in Laggere ward, a part of Rajarajeshwari Nagar constituency.

Once a village and then a part of the erstwhile Rajarajeshwari Nagar City Municipal Council, Laggere is now under transformation into an urban conglomeration.

Except Jalahalli, HMT, Yeshwanthpur and JP Park, other wards — Rajarajeshwari Nagar, Jnana Bharathi, Kottigepalya and Lakshmidevi Nagar — are not close to Malleswaram either.

These nine wards across a distance of 22 km, from Rajarajeshwari Nagar in the South-West to JP Park in the North-West, represent two extremities — development and under-development.

The common thread bringing these wards together is the lack of healthcare facilities, garbage disposal and absence of Cauvery water supply.

K.M. Suresh, a resident of Laggere, said the area does not have Cauvery water supply. The bore-well water is hard and not potable, he said and added that the civic authorities should provide for underground sewerage system. Otherwise, outbreak of epidemic is certain, he cautioned.

Puttatayamma, resident of Byraveshwaranagar in Laggere said the authorities have allowed flow of sewage and dumping of garbage on the road adjacent to her residence creating a health hazard.

“Ragi Mill” Seenappa, a resident of Narasimhaswamy Badavane in Laggere, said precious time of women in the locality is wasted in fetching water.

“They spend at least two to three hours every day running from one public tap to another to fetch water,” regretted Mr. Seenappa.

The situation is almost similar in almost all the wards in this constituency except parts of Rajarajeshwari Nagar, HMT, Jalahalli and JP Park wards.

The only solace for these new areas of the Bruhat Bangalore Mahanagara Palike has been the accelerated pace of road asphalting work, Mr. Suresh noted.

Laggere and many other village areas which had just kachcha roads now have a new look, cleanly asphalted roads, thanks to the initiatives of the Government to develop the new areas of the BBMP, he added.