Hyderabad: A house owner in Hyderabad has waived off rents of his 75 tenants which came to Rs 3.4 lakh during the lockdown. The 41-year-old Koduri Balalingam who lives in Balanagar owns three buildings in the city. He told his tenants that they need not pay him rent for April.
Times of India quoted Koduri Balalingam as saying “I know what it is to go hungry. I have had my own struggles in life. I do not want any of these families to suffer during this crunch time.”
He has rented one-bedroom flats to industrial workers, mostly from Bihar. Saying that they have no means of earning, he further added that he will think of waiving rent for the next month as well, if the lockdown continues.
This was not the only thing he did to play Good Samaritan during lockdown, he has also distributed Rs 2.5 lakh among 250 poor families both in Telangana and Andhra Pradesh.
Balalingam, who hails from Rajapeta village in Telangana’s Rajanna Sircilla district, has a long history of charitable deeds. So far he has contributed a total of Rs 1.20 crore to people in need. He granted scholarships to meritorious students, installed a water plant in his village, helping families of RTC workers who were on strike and paid salaries for volunteers to assist with their teaching in government schools.
It must be recalled that CM K Chandrasekhar Rao had also urged house owners to be considerate towards tenants. However, Balalingam did what came to him naturally.