However, they are facing opposition from the shopkeepers whose business thrives because of the Charminar.
The city's planners want to create a landscape in a 30-metre buffer zone around the 412-year-old monument. However, the pedestrianisation project has run into trouble.
"If they are going to create a buffer zone and stop traffic, why demolish our shops?," asked a shopkeeper.
Shopkeepers oppose move
Shopkeepers argue moving the bangle shops away will diminish the old city aura of the Charminar and also rob them of their USP.
"If this happens our business will shut. What our ancestors did will all stop," rues a local shopkeeper.
No structure more than 10 metres high is to be allowed around the Charminar.
Necessity more than luxury
But decongesting the area is a necessity rather than a luxury.
Heavy vehicular traffic virtually kisses the Charminar and studies have established that air and noise pollution are damaging the monument.
As a result, repair work has become an all-year affair.
"The shops have been operating from there for hundreds of years now. So if we now want to acquire those properties, they are asking for alternate land. And the land they have identified is under dispute,'' said M V Sathyanarayana, Additional Commissioner, MCH.
The Rs 139 crore 'Charminar-by-foot' project was conceived five years ago and the authorities hope it will be completed at least in the next three years.
