The process of tenders for maintenance of toll gates on the Outer Ring Road has become controversial. A Mumbai-based company has approached the court alleging confidentiality of details and giving less time for tender submission. There are 19 toll gates on the 158 km ORR. Two new ones are under construction. Two companies operate these plazas and their contract expires in October.HMDA Growth Corridor has invited tenders for 12 toll plazas for 18 months, one for 12 toll plazas, and another for 7 plazas. The deadline for pre-bidding is October 15th to the 29th of the same month. The companies participating in the pre-bidding are required to participate in the final tenders. A Mumbai-based company has approached the high court saying it was impossible for new companies to study tenders and gather the necessary information in such a short time.The company also alleged that the officials are maintaining confidentiality without giving full details. Authorities have been accused of trying to profit from one of the two companies that currently operate the toll gates. In fact, full details should be mentioned in the notification after the tender is announced. They should be explained to the bidding companies at the pre-bidding meeting. But the Mumbai company alleged that the tender process was going on without them. HMDA is hoping to generate revenue of Rs 450 - Rs 500 crore a year through these tenders but this case will come as a roadblock.

Controversy Over Tenders For ORR Toll Gates

<a href="https://www.google.com/maps/dir//Indira+Park/data=!4m6!4m5!1m1!4e2!1m2!1m1!1s0x3bcb99e4e62590af:0x1d76369ebfdc0c63?sa=X&amp;ved=2ahUKEwi65ISyhLb0AhWzxTgGHQGyAFoQ9Rd6BAhHEAM">Indira Park</a> is one of the most popular parks in the city which attracts so many visitors every day. But then, people are having to struggle with the unbearable stench when they go there. The toilets in the park and the bathrooms are not being cleaned. Visitors and walkers are struggling as a result.&nbsp;Many who come to the park every day complain to the officials at the park about this but their complaints are being ignored. The toilets and bathrooms in the park, which should be regularly cleaned by the staff, are not cleaned neatly and regularly. In addition, some of the toilets are often locked troubling the visitors and walkers.A similar situation is prevailing in all the toilets and bathrooms in Indira Park for the past few months. In some of the existing toilets, the taps are not functional and there is no water supply. The walkers allege that authorities are hand in glove with the contractor and are paying no heed to the complaints.&nbsp;"If this is the case with the Indira Park which is near the GHMC office, you can understand what the rest of the parks in the city are like. GHMC officials and local public representatives should respond to the problems of the visitors and fix the problem of toilets and bathrooms immediately," Subash, a walker tells Nearby News.

Indira Park Stinking Negligence

Citizens are getting ready for the festivals on Christmas Eve and New Year. The most important part of Christmas is the preparation of the cake. The festival buzz has already started. Cake Mixing Events Celebrations getting started by leading hotels and organizations.&nbsp;The cake-making events will continue until Christmas. The tradition of cake mixing has come from the West and people will be enjoying mixing dry fruits like black currants, golden apricots, figs, dates, candied orange peel, candied ginger, dry cherries, etc. These dry fruits are fermented in wine at least 45 days.The baking begins on December 15th. The cakes thus made will be sold and gifted as well. The cake mixing events have begun in the first week of November and many star hotels that have finished their first-round events are gearing up for the second. Cake mixing is typically a community event wherein people get together and have fun.

Cake Mixing Events Bring Christmas Fervor To Hyderabad

Leading Electric Scooters Brand, <a href="https://www.atherenergy.com/">Ather Energy</a> has launched another showroom in the city in view of the growing demand for electric vehicles. The showroom was setup in association with Pride Motors at Nagole Ex-Road in Hyderabad. The first showroom is present in Madhapur and it was set up in February this year.Speaking on the occasion, Ravneet Singh Phokela, Chief Business Officer, said, "Sales have quadrupled since the inception of the first outlet and there has been a huge demand for EVs in recent times. We are planning retail outlets very soon in Warangal and Khammam".The company has already set up Seventeen fast charging stations in Hyderabad in the wake of customers experiencing charging difficulties. It is also planning to set up ten more stations soon. The company currently sells Ether 450X worth Rs 1,46,926 and Ether 450 Plus scooters worth Rs 1,27,916 in Hyderabad.

Ather Energy Starts Second Showroom In Nagole

Union Civil Aviation Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia has said that new airports will be needed as the number of passengers on flights across the country has increased significantly. "There should be two airports for every city, especially for the metro cities. Airports in metro cities like Hyderabad, Mumbai, Delhi as well as Bangalore were the busiest," he said."The construction of new airports in Delhi and Mumbai is already underway. There is a need to build a second airport in Hyderabad as well as cities like Kolkata and Bangalore. Five new airports, 6 heliports, and 50 UDAN routes would be launched in the next 100 days. If not launch, we would at least start the construction," he said.&nbsp;However, it is not clear whether Hyderabad will get the chance any sooner. However, aviation industry experts cast doubts on the feasibility of a second airport in Hyderabad since the city’s lone airport was far from realizing its optimum capacity. The current passengers' number would be nowhere near pre-Covid times.

Second Airport For Hyderabad?

Crops are being damaged by heavy rains. Especially with the damage to vegetable crops, their prices are skyrocketing. Prices of almost all the vegetables have skyrocketed as yields have fallen due to the recent heavy rains. Almost all prices are at a minimum of 60 Rupees per kilo. Tomato prices have skyrocketed.&nbsp;At present, the price of tomatoes has reached Rs 140 per kg at the farmer's market. Apples are a lot cheaper than Tomatoes in Hyderabad. Only a couple of months ago, the tomatoes were available for as low as Eight rupees per kilo in the retail markets. Pulses, carrots, and Bitterguard sell for Rs 60 to Rs 70 per kg.&nbsp;Spinach, green chilies, and brinjals are costing 100 Rupees per kilo. People are lamenting that spending 500 Rupees do not even get vegetables for two days. Agriculture officials say prices have risen as heavy rains have damaged the ready-to-yield crops. In addition to this, transport charges are going up due to the rise in oil prices. Farmers say it is costly to bring vegetables from villages to towns.

Apples Cheaper Than Tomatoes

On Wednesday, <a href="https://www.absolutebarbecues.com/index">Absolute Barbecues</a> (AB's), a leading barbecue restaurant chain, opened its 48th restaurant (and 7th in Telangana) in Kompally. AB's invited its top admirers as chief guests for the inauguration, which is their trademark. Ritam Mukherjee, South Operations Regional Head, Absolute Barbecues, and Debabrata Mishra, Corporate Chef, Absolute Barbecues, did the ribbon cutting along with the other chief guests.AB's was started in 2013 and has 9 restaurants in Andhra and Telangana, of which 7 are in Hyderabad. AB's restaurants are located at Jubilee Hills, Banjara Hills, Miyapur, Gachbowli, Inorbit Mall, Secunderabad, and now Kompally.The barbecue chain also has plans to organize a Carnival this festive season to celebrate Christmas and New Year, from 22nd December to 2nd January, which will have food plus entertainment, with a lot of interesting recipes and engagement on the floor – with music, dance, and fun.&nbsp;During the carnival, there will be a lot of exotic roast foods, grills, cake stations, desserts to go with the flavors of the Christmas season.&nbsp; &nbsp;The restaurant also has a 'complete' open kitchen, where the guests can see the food being prepared for them, be it the starters or main course.&nbsp;Absolute Barbecues is famous for its novel 'Wish Grill' concept, which provides its customers with a Do-It-Yourself experience.The Kompally branch has a seating capacity of 130 guests, which can be booked for any celebration or event. The barbecue delicacies can be enjoyed at just Rs 649.

Absolute Barbecues 'Wish Grill' Restaurant Now in Kompally

In the early hours of Wednesday, an auto driver named Syed Zahid rescued a six-year-old girl near Abids GPO who was being molested. The minor girl was sleeping on the footpath with her maternal uncle and mother when a man molested her and tried to rape her.Auto driver Zahid, who was on the road waiting for passengers, noticed this, rushed to the spot, rescued the girl, and woke her mother up. The offender, identified as Mohammed Chotu, was then handed over to Abids police, where a case was registered against him by Zahid and her mother.Hyderabad Police Commissioner <a href="https://twitter.com/CPHydCity">Anjani Kumar</a> felicitated Zahid for foiling the rape attempt. Inquiries revealed that Chotu is a habitual offender and was arrested in a theft case by the Afzalgunj police in July this year.

Police Commissioner Felicitates Auto Driver for Foiling Rape Attempt

Zenwork is a digital tax compliance and regulatory reporting solutions provider, which recently managed to raise Rs 1200 crore from Spectrum Equity. Now, it is gearing up to upscale its operations both in Hyderabad and the US. As of now, the company has a 60-member team, and it is planning to up the number to 180-200 by the end of 2022.The company will use its newly acquired funds to build capabilities globally for its go-to-market strategy. It will also accelerate its product innovation and meet the growing demand for automated technology solutions that address regulatory compliance and enable electronic filing and information management.Sanjeev Singh, co-founder, and CEO of Zenworks, shares that they intend to increase the number of employees to 120-140 in Hyderabad. For the same, they are looking at a talent pool with skills such as engineering, product management, business analytics, digital marketing, and sales operations.While the company’s base is in the US, they have now started catering to India, APAC, and European markets. Singh adds that they have a full-fledged analyst team in Hyderabad. Zenworks is also extending fintech services helping out the banking sector in terms of KYC and identity checks. It also works with the largest credit card processors and ensures to mitigate risk. The company operates in a highly regulated ecosystem going through audits related to data privacy.Singh also says that they have innovated for the market and built the first API to connect with clients and partnerships to differentiate their services. For the uninitiated, Zenworks helps companies manage compliance and offers solutions that transform resource-intensive, manual processes into highly automated, digital experiences. In the process, it serves over 1,00,000 small businesses, including 30,000 CPA firms as well as large enterprises.The company’s CEO shares that Zenworks will engage with several fintech start-ups in Hyderabad to build the ecosystem further and build transformative digital solutions.

Zenwork to Expand Base, Increase HeadCount

The state government is committed to the idea of having electric vehicles or EVs on roads. And by the year 2035, petrol and diesel cars would be a thing of the past, according to many analysts. Road Transport Authority (<a href="https://www.transport.telangana.gov.in/">RTA</a>) of the west zone, CPV Rao, says that EVs are indeed the future.&nbsp;Given the increasing prices of fuel and scarcity of fossil fuel, it looks like EVs will be a reality sooner than expected by many. It is estimated that diesel vehicles will come down to a mere 20 percent in a few years and are likely to disappear from the market and roads too. In fact, according to Rao, diesel vehicles are likely to end up in scrap.However, the only hitch for faster conversion happens to be the speed. Battery-operated EVs are no match to the speed of diesel and petrol-run vehicles. Also, those who have combustion vehicles will have a tough time maintaining them, and re-registration charges will also go up, making it costly to maintain such vehicles.Already, there is a policy in the pipeline with regards to having all EVs on the road by 2035. Then there is the breed that owns vintage cars. One such person from the city happens to be Capt Kayarmin Piston, the owner of <a href="https://www.chermasindia.com/">Chermas</a> Showrooms and a lot of vintage cars. He shares that it has indeed become a problem to own and maintain vintage vehicles as the parts need to be imported from the countries they were manufactured in. However, he adds that they permission from the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways that allows them to register a vehicle that is older than 50 years. He says such owners can also run their vehicles all across the country with this national permit, in case they have fitness certificates and insurance.In all, it would be prudent to invest in an EV instead of regretting later.

Vintage or Outdated? EVs to Take Over Automobile Industry in a Big Way

Drink and driving checks by Hyderabad police are becoming a cause of worry amid rising concerns of public negligence over Covid safety precautions. Weekend checks by the city police to nab drivers riding two-wheelers or driving their cars in a drunken state are witnessing some cops not replacing the disposable straws into which people are required to blow into to register their blood alcohol levels.In these COVID times, health experts warn that the practice of not replacing disposable straws is the worst anyone can think of. Not just the danger of COVID spread, there is also the risk of transmission of various other bacterial and viral diseases with drink and driving tests.Dr. Ranga Reddy Burri, president of the infection control academy of India, warns that the most likely to spread with this dangerous practice is the oral simplex disease on the borders of the lips. He also added that this practice of blowing into the breath analyzer could cause many infectious diseases like HIV, the Epstein Barr virus, ebola, the human papillomavirus, and the Zika virus, which spread through saliva.Especially during pandemics, the right to health is one of the most important rights of the citizens, and they should demand the single usage of disposable straws.However, the police have denied the usage of the same straws for multiple people and said that public health safety is always on their minds during such checks. Anjani Kumar, the commissioner of Hyderabad police, said the policemen follow the safety protocols, and strict action will be taken with those indulging in such violations.Hanmanth Rao, Assistant Commissioner of Police, Traffic, Madhapur, clarified that they are replacing the straws after a single-use.