Visitors to MG Park complain about dirty toilets, lack of water

Hubballi: Mahatma Gandhi Park, one of the major parks and an important landmark of the city along with Indira Gandhi Glass House, are lacking basic facilities.
For many days, people, particularly women are struggling to get basic facilities such as toilets and drinking water. The toilets here do not have water supply and even proper doors.

The park’s visitors are cursing civic authorities for not maintaining the public space properly.

After taking the responsibility of maintaining the park from Nirmiti Kendra, HDMC officials had prepared an action plan to restore the park in a phased manner. But before the action plan could be implemented, MG Park was listed under Smart City Project and the civic authorities started ignoring the maintenance of the park.

They have ignored the demands of joggers for basic amenities and are pointing fingers at Smart city authorities who have remained mute spectators.

The situation at the park came to the fore due to the khadi mela that took place at Indira Galas House. Hundreds of people who visited the mela also went to the park. Many senior citizens and women complained about the lack of proper toilets and other basic facilities at the park.

Shant Kumari, a bank employee said, “At least HDMC should take minimum responsibility of providing basic facilities when they are providing MG Park on rent for melas and exhibitions. As I am suffering from diabetes, I found it very difficult to attend to nature’s call.”

Rukminibai Meharwade, resident of Deshpande Nagar said, “I came to the park for the khadi exhibition. There is no proper drinking water here. There is water in a few water dispensers but no glasses to drink. When they charge Rs 10 as entry fee, why can’t the authorities provide facilities?” she said.

Officialspeak

HDMC commissioner Shakeel Ahmed told TOI, “At this stage we can't do any renovation or restructuring work at MG Park because it comes under the Smart City Project. We can maintain cleanliness of the park and other works, but no restructuring or renovation work will be done by us.”