Ludhiana residents abandon social distancing over walk & talk in parks

Ludhiana: After opening of public parks like Rose Garden and Rakh Bagh, people have started coming there for jogging and exercise between 5am and 9am while in the evening these areas are not open for public movement.
Due to Covid-19, there is lesser number of the elderly as well as kids coming there, but the caretaker and staff at Rose Garden claim that visitors coming to the park sometimes forget to maintain social distancing. Even in Rakh Bagh some people were seen violating the social distancing norms and were found sitting close together. Open gyms in these parks are not yet reopened for the public.
TOI team made a visit to Rose Garden and Rakh Bagh on Saturday morning where people were seen exercising, jogging and doing yoga. While some were with a group of friends, others had come alone. A group was doing yoga on one side of Rose Garden and when TOI reporter and photo journalist reached there and asked them why they were not following social distancing and other safety norms like wearing masks, they requested public parks should not be closed. One of them said, “Only we know how we had spent two months of lockdown without coming to the Rose Garden. The government should not close down the parks again.”
In other parts of the park it was found that some had come with their kids as vacations are going on in schools and children have nothing to do at home these days. Many were also seeing playing badminton.
Situation was not much different in Rakh Bagh. While many were jogging inside the park, a group was seen sitting near the entrance where people feed the pigeons on daily basis. Though cycling has been allowed in Rakh Bagh, many are not interested in doing the same.
Vijay Kumar, a daily visitor to Rose Garden, said, “We come here for morning walk and to enjoy fresh air. We are also aware of coronavirus and take all precautions while visiting a public place.”
Junior engineer of the Ludhiana civic body and in charge of Rose Garden Kripal Singh said they keep on asking people to leave if they had completed done their exercise or walk as it was not safe for several people to gather at one place especially when Covid-19 cases were increasing. He added that while some people listen, others ignore and even argue with them.