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Human chain against HC annexe building in Cubbon Park

Last Updated 18 November 2019, 02:02 IST
.People protest in front of the building which is proposed to make way for a 7-story building at Cubbon Park in Bengaluru on Sunday. | DH Photo: Pushkar V
.People protest in front of the building which is proposed to make way for a 7-story building at Cubbon Park in Bengaluru on Sunday. | DH Photo: Pushkar V
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Continuing the protest against the seven-storey annexe building of the Karnataka High Court inside Cubbon Park, citizens on Sunday formed a human chain around the old Election Commission office.

Senior citizens, youngsters, cyclists and joggers, numbering more than a hundred, linked hands in the human chain, in what is the second installment of their campaign against the government move to build the high-rise inside the prominent lung space.

This followed a major protest two weeks ago.

“The government has been continuously waging a war against the environment in the name of development and comforts,” social activist H M Venkatesh said during the protest, organised by the Cubbon Park Walkers’ Association (CPWA).

“There are many public spaces available with the government which they can’t use for the proposed construction. If we allow this (building), then there won’t be lung space for the future generation.”

Dhruv J, a Class 11 student who participated in the protest, said anything in the name of development that harms the environment threatens the public as well.

“I have spent several days of my childhood in this park and watching the mass destruction in its vicinity is unacceptable,” he said, adding that the buildings like the proposed seven-storey structure would destroy the greenery.

Protesters said the garden city of Bengaluru should not be allowed to become like Delhi. If the lung space is replaced with a concrete jungle, the oxygen bar opened recently in Delhi may be needed here in the near future, they added.

“We conduct GOQii active fitness sessions in Cubbon Park and have a special bonding with this place,” said Anitha Rao, a CV Raman Nagar resident who visits the park every day. “We can’t see the high-rise building coming up here. Cubbon Park is lung space for all of us. We all need this and don’t need high-rise buildings and more traffic movement. Our city is known as the garden city, but the so-called development is pushing out oxygen from here.”

Class 8 student Yashaswini D R had difficulty understanding the contrast between the environmental protection she is reading about in her textbooks and the kind of destruction taking place in a prominent green area like Cubbon Park. “Our syllabus teaches us the right thing, which I want to see (implemented) here. I plead to the authorities to save Cubbon Park.”

Next protest on Nov 24

Organisers have called for another human chain protest on November 24 to send out a stronger message against the government’s decision.

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(Published 17 November 2019, 18:41 IST)

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