Ruling, opposition councillors demand greener city parks

The condition of parks in east Delhi brought both the opposition and the treasury benches together, when a majority of the councillors raised the issue in the House meeting of East Delhi Municipal Corporation on Tuesday.

The councillors alleged that a majority of the parks in their wards are in bad shape. They mentioned shortage of gardeners, maintenance equipment, no tubewells, motors, no lights and fencing among the major reason for their poor maintenance.

“There are 109 parks in my ward, but there are only nine gardeners to take care of them. It is impractical to believe that such a small number of garderners could maintain as many parks, especially when many of them have grown old,” said Rajiv Verma, Congress councillor from Gharoli.

Other councillors said that the special campaigns of the horticulture department — to plant one lakh trees this monsoon when their staff members lack in basic instruments of gardening — is next to impossible.

“The gardeners do not have basic instruments like grass cutters and steel cutting blades. Moreover, tubewells in most of the parks are non-functional. How would the plants survive if their is no water supply for the parks?” said Lata Gupta, BJP councillor from Pandav Nagar.

Councillors also alleged that several parks have been turned into dumpng grounds or are used by small-time vendors because the boundary walls have collapsed.

No dearth of staff

However, East Delhi Municipal Corporation commissioner S S Yadav said while the suggestions of the councillor would be taken into consideration, there is no dearth of staff members.

“As per the norms of number of gardeners vis-a-vis the number and area of the parks, there is enough number of gardeners available. For the 985 parks spread over 800 acres, there are 968 gardeners with the EDMC, which meets
the established norms,” Yadav said.

There are two categories of parks owned by the municipal corporation – one-acre ornamental and 1.5-acre general.

The members also demanded better benches in the park and tree guards to protect  saplings that are being planted by the corporation as part of its special afforestation campaign.