Broken swings, benches: Hindi Park hit by apathy

New Delhi: Hindi Park in Daryaganj, managed by the Municipal Corporation of Delhi, is languishing in neglect. Divided into sections, the children's section has broken slides, benches, and horticultural waste lying around. Local residents said that even with a bit of rain, the park gets flooded. The gates are broken and stray dogs freely roam inside. On Wednesday, there were also two-wheelers parked inside and homeless people sleeping though there were schoolchildren present and playing.
"I take my daughter to the park as it is the only one close to our house," said Seema Wadhwa, who lives in Daryaganj."But the slides are broken and sometimes people can be seen playing cards and smoking in the park. There usually are stray dogs around, making it unsafe for children. There is no green cover in the children's area." The park also has an open gym but due to lack of maintenance, many of the installations are broken or have parts missing.
"This park has seen better days," remarked Mohammad Ashfaq, another local resident. "The authorities as well as visitors should have a sense of responsibility in keeping the park clean and green. There is garbage littered everywhere. Rain means the children's area gets flooded and results in mosquito breeding."
While MCD has been developing theme parks in the past few years, traditional parks like these are struggling. Open gyms have been installed in more than 1,000 MCD parks and a few DDA parks. These units are mostly sponsored by MP/MLALAD funds and each costs Rs 7-8 lakh.
Last year, there was a requirement of more than 4,426 gardeners for the upkeep of the 15,229 parks managed by MCD. How many of these vacancies for gardeners were filled is not clear as of now.
Ankush Narang, who is an Aam Aadmi Party councillor from Ranjeet Nagar, raised the matter last year when he said the maintenance of 72 parks in his ward has become a ‘headache' for him.
Sarika Choudhary, also an AAP councillor, said that funds had been sanctioned for the redevelopment of Hindi Park and restoration work should have started. "I will check the matter raised by you," she said in response to TOI's queries on the matter. MCD itself did not have an official response to queries.