| Morning walkers, children slam BJP, PDP Govt for park's plight | | Nai Basti's Vijay Park in shambles, thanks to admin, netas | |  Early Times Report
Jammu, June 21: A pond in Nai Basti was officially converted into a park in 1960 and henceforth named Vijay Park. The idea behind the conversion was to prevent the encroachment of the pond, but the park was never upgraded like other parks in the city, thanks to administrative and political apathy.
Several senior citizens of the area while talking to Early Times slammed the administration for its failure upgrade the Vijay Park even after six decades after its establishment.
"A decade ago, a fountain was constructed in the park. The fountain stands filled with filth in absence of a caretaker", said Kulwant Sehgal, who visits the park in the evening.
On Friday evening, as Sehgal was accompanied by his companions Shiv Dyal, Lal Ji, Nanak Chand, Sat Pal Gupta, Shanti Sawroop Khajuria and Ratan Kumar, he recollected that the site was a pond before 1960.
"Some people started encroaching upon the pond by filling it. At that time some residents chipped in to save the pond from encroachers," Sehgal said and added that since then the park is waiting for its up-gradation.
These elderly people blamed the administration that works on diktats of politicians who acted as main hurdle in the development. "We approached the Congress MLA Raman Bhalla (during the Congress rule) and later the BJP MLA Kavinder Gupta (in BJP-PDP government) and requested for up-gradation of the Vijay Park. Our repeated requests, however, fell on deaf ears", said the evening and morning walkers.
Harjeet Kour, Surinder Gupta and Koushalya Devi said that recently they took up the matter of weeds in the park with Mayor JMC, and later a team visited to clean the park. Still the park needs more attention of the JMC.
The residents of nearby Peer Baba Nai Basti said that road in their area is in a deplorable condition for many years. "We had requested the then MLA Kavinder Gupta, when he was Speaker Assembly and later when he was made Deputy Chief Minister, for blacktopping of the road. He did not, however, keep his promise", they said.
Subash Chander, another local resident, said that in rainy season water, enters the residential houses, as the area lacks proper drainage system.
"We took up the issue of uncovered drains with Kavinder Gupta. On his directions a contractor laid some concrete over a portion of drain, but rather than serving purpose, it has become a problem for us", Chander added. |
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