A celebration of Hyderabad’s most iconic buildings, moments

The year 2018 will go down in history as the year of centenaries with at least five major events, which impacted the lives of people in Hyderabad, completing 100 years. The civil supplies department, set up in 1918 when thousands of people fell victim to frequent episodes of famine, completed 100 years in August. The landmark event, though, went completely unnoticed. There were occasions when several pockets of princely Hyderabad state ran out of food stocks. Rice supplies, then, were rationed at 50 grams per head per day and it was increased to 100 grams only in 1950.

The pandemic flu of 1918 resulted in the decline of Hyderabad city population by 9.4% -- the population of Hyderabad state in the 1921 census was lower than that of 1911. There were more deaths than births and the decadal population dropped from 1.33 crore in 1911 to 1.24 crore in 1921. The flu which struck in September 1918 killed 46.5 people per 1000 that month and the death toll increased rapidly to 464 deaths per 1000 by Octoberend. Two per cent (3.50 lakh) of Hyderabad’s population had been wiped out within a month.




2018 was also the year when the National Institute of Nutrition (NIN), set up as Beri-Beri Enquiry Unit at Coonoor in Tamil Nadu, turned

100. It was shifted to Hyderabad in 1958.



Also completing a century was the Hyderabad Currency Act 1918 which introduced paper money for the first time. Earlier, only coins were in use. The Act came into force on June 4, 1918.



The Osmania University was also set up in 1918 though the institute celebrated the centenary in 2017.

While exams went online, campuses erupted with unrest and agitation

From reforms to resentment, 2018 was a mixed bag for students and parents. After almost two decades since its inception, common entrance tests such as Eamcet, ICET among others went online for those seeking admission to various professional courses.

In a major development, Telangana joined the national pool for medical courses by earmarking 15% of MBBS seats and 50% of postgraduate medical seats to students from other states.

What rocked Hyderabad this year was a string of student protests reported from top institutions such as Birla Institute of Technology Science, Tata Institute of Social Science, apart from other engineering colleges such as Vasavi College of Engineering, Chaitanya Bharati Institute of Technology etc. Their demands ranged from fee regulation to continuation of courses.

Those in school found no respite from the spiralling fee structure as the state government for the first time ordered school managements to maintain status-quo on the fee hike and issued an admission notification. Subsequently, on January 22, the Hyderabad High Court issued an interim order allowing schools to hike fee, leaving parents fuming. It was only closer to the end of year that the Delhi Public School, Mahendra Hills, decision to slash fee by 50% brought them some hope.

Apart from fees, two alleged cases of sexual abuse of primary students reported from a private school in Tolichowki, added to the angst of parents who demanded better surveillance in educational institutions.

City set to get an AIIMS, but will H1N1 deaths stop?

Right at the beginning, the government found itself in a spot with maternal deaths showing a three-fold jump since 2016-2017.

The core Hyderabad district itself reported as many as 105 maternal deaths compared to just 31 in 2017.

A worried healthcare department put all heads together and managed to bring things under control by strengthening government hospitals and introducing several health schemes, including KCR Kits, where pregnant women were given financial assistance in instalments towards the end of the year.




Fee regulation among several other issues triggered protests from students at top institutes such as TISS, BITS and many others

The maternal mortality rate (MMR) now stands at 70 female deaths per 100,000 live births. But right through the year, the government struggled to contain the deadly swine flu (H1N1) virus, with 154 deaths officially recorded till October this year and with 90% cases reported in Hyderabad city itself. If the battle to control the mutated virus was an uphill task, the dengue virus with 2,700 deaths and malaria with 1,500 deaths, underscored the government’s failure to tackle diseases in Hyderabad. The health department also struggled to create more jobs and depute doctors and other necessary staff to rural areas, forcing patients to flock to Hyderabad’s hospitals.

On a positive note, the decision to renovate the heritage block of the iconic Osmania General Hospital and build a new hospital premises, came as a welcome move. On December 20, Telangana received happy tidings, when the Union cabinet finally clearing the decks for the establishment of a new All India Institute for Medical Sciences (AIIMS) in Bibinagar, at a cost of Rs 1,028 crore. The new prestigious facility spread over 200 acres will also have 100 MBBS seats.

(This is the first of a four-part series)