First Amrut park of city is ready; residents happy over its completion

Ludhiana: The barren chunk opposite Lodhi Club has now turned into a lush green space in one year, where residents are enjoying free time during morning and evening hours. Under the Atal Mission for Rejuvenation and Urban Transformation (AMRUT) funding, this green belt has been developed in J block, Rajguru Nagar and is a first of its kind in the city. However, the civic body is yet to take over the belt because there is shortage of funds and staff to maintain the park.
The park has come up on 4.24 acres, where separate space has been designated for swings of children and separate paths have been created for public to walk. During morning and evening hours there is a rush in the park as area residents visit it for spending some leisure time.
Junior engineer of horticulture wing of MC Kripal Singh said the park was ready and it had been developed beautifully, but they are yet to take over it. He said for maintaining this park there is a requirement of at least 12 people and already there is a scarcity of staff in the wing. He said the authorities would decide what to do with this belt.
Meanwhile, the residents are elated over completion of this park. Harjit Singh, a resident of Rajguru Nagar, said, “We have other parks in the locality, but this is big one and we enjoy a lot here. There is a need to develop some more barren lands into green space so that pollution level of city could decrease and residents could become healthy.”
Another resident from BRS Nagar, Sonia Verma, said it was good that green belts had been developed beautifully but it should be well maintained. She said only development was not enough, but its maintenance was equally important.
Meanwhile, councillor from ward number 73 Seema Kapoor shared that the development of green belt near Lodhi Club had given benefit to at least 6,000-7,000 people living in J block of Rajguru Nagar and Housing Board colony, because there were very small parks. She said it was a big park for the residents to enjoy their free time.
The process to develop these parks had started in 2017 but it took almost a year to finalise the detailed project reports because the Punjab Municipal Infrastructure Development Corporation (PMIDC) was monitoring the work. The entire 2018 and first three months of 2019 were wasted in tendering process and finalising the contractor. In June 2019, the work started, which was complete now.