Southern States - Andhra Pradesh-Hyderabad   

No time spared in collecting scrap

By Our Staff Reporter

HYDERABAD Sept. 21. Even as the last of the Ganesh idols was being immersed in the wee hours of Saturday, teams of retrievers began taking a plunge into the Hussain Sagar lake.

The salvage operations had labourers seeking to make some money by collecting raw material such as bamboo and iron used for the idols, flocking the immersion sites in large numbers. Forming teams, youngsters entered the water to catch the sinking idols and dragged to shore while women and the elderly began working on them.

Using sticks and hacksaw, the workers peeled off the plaster for the iron shafts, wood and other material that formed the skeleton of the idol. Tiring job it was, but perched atop those huge idols, they hacked through one layer after another to shred the idols to pieces.

``We collect all we can till evening and sell it to the scrap dealers. For every kilogram of iron, we get Rs. 3,'' says Srinu, leader of a team that trailed the biggest Ganesh idol from Khairatabad to Tank Bund in a bid to prevent others from getting to it.

Another team from Borabanda was busy at a distance grabbing whatever they ccould from the immersion site. "By selling all these material, at least Rs. 100 is assured to each of us,'' says Bala Kumarayya, an electrician by profession, who lead the team.

Once the idols floating close to the shore were done with, divers began searching for the submerged ones. One would take a dip, locate an idol and then the whole gang would join him. After repeated efforts, they would catch hold of whatever was left of the idol and pull it to the shore.

``It's horrible down here. It smells so awful,'' quips an associate of Srinu, after one of his forays into the polluted water of Hussain Sagar.

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