House rents go sky high at Kaleshwaram

​Kaleshwaram (Bhupalpally): Getting a house for rent in the tiny temple town of Kaleshwaram, which barely has a population of 5,000, is next to impossible. Thanks to the ongoing works of the Kaleshwaram Lift Irrigation Project (KLIP), touted as lifeline of north Telangana, that spurred the demand for rental houses in the town.

As it is the only town located close to the project sites, Kaleshwaram has been witnessing a huge demand for rented houses which invariably led to the spiraling of rentals to enormous proportions on par with Warangal city.

With three of the major components of the KLIP - Medigadda and Annaram barrages and Kannepally pump house - are geographically close to Kaleshwaram, every employee and worker associated with the project turned their eyes on temple town. It may be noted here that the project works that started a couple of years back continues to pick up pace as the government is hellbent on completing it as quickly as possible. As a result, the manpower engaged in the construction work also increased leaps and bounds. Now, it’s estimated that nearly 6,500 are associated with the KLIP works consisting of labourers, engineers and contractors.

Adding more to it, the temple town has also become home for the employees working with the Telangana State Mineral Development Corporation (TSMDC) and sand quarry labourers. Seeing the growing demand for accommodation, the house owners increased rents exorbitantly.

Now getting a single room in the town is all but impossible as they were already occupied long ago. A single room costs above Rs 4,000 per month. The rent varies anywhere between Rs 6,500 and Rs 8,500 for a three-room house. As if this was not enough, some of the house owners hike the rent by 10 and 15 per cent once a new tenant occupies the house. As a result, some of the officials and workers have located themselves in Mahadevpur which is 17 kms.

Speaking to The Hans India, Upa-Sarpanch of Kaleshwaram Md Sultan said: “Although our town attracts nearly 10,000 devotees every day, hitherto there was no such demand for houses. Even though 400-odd new houses have come up in the town of late, it’s not sufficient for the growing demand.” He said that town now has nearly 2,200 houses. Most of the single rooms accommodate four to five persons each. With people working in different shifts, they are somehow managing to push the days.