NMC confirms reservation of playground in city’s DP

Nagpur: The concretizing of playground in Priyadarshini Colony, behind Nagpur City RTO office, continues to haunt the NMC as the verification, carried out after TOI expose, has confirmed reservation of the playground in the city’s development plan (DP). Now, it remains to be seen what action the civic body takes against its engineers who went against rules and executed the project without seeking mandatory permissions.
TOI had between April 18 and 22 reported how the Nagpur Municipal Corporation (NMC) concretized and covered the playground with paver blocks so as to convert it into a parking place in violation of rules and also high court orders.
On the recommendation of co-opted corporator Nishant Gandhi, West Nagpur MLA Sudhakar Deshmukh had secured approval for Rs25 lakh funds from the state government for the work. Ignoring brazen violations in the proposal, NMC engineers went ahead and executed the work.
Referring to TOI reports, amicus curiae Prafulla S Khubalkar had moved a civil application in an ongoing PIL in the Nagpur bench of Bombay high court related to playgrounds seeking restoration of the playground and action against all responsible for the works. The HC had issued notices to all respondents.
Following this, municipal commissioner Abhijit Bangar directed the officials of town planning department and Dharampeth zone to inspect the playground and check in the DP about its reservation.
A team of NMC officials led by assistant director of town planning PB Gawande and assistant commissioner Mahesh Moroney inspected the playground a couple of days ago and they verified the same in the DP.
NMC sources told TOI that the officials have confirmed the reservation of playground. “Consent of town planning department is a must before executing any civil works in such cases. The officials also confirmed that engineers neglected consent of the town planning department before executing the works. The playground and public money could have been saved had the town planning department consulted earlier,” sources said.
TOI had also reported about similar destruction of nazul land reserved for park in Khamla. On the recommendation of a politician, the NMC had concretized and laid paver blocks for parking purposes that too neglecting long pending demand of the residents for development of a park. In an another violation, the work was done using funds meant for development of backward class communities.