RAWALPINDI: Even three months after the launch of the metro bus service, public parks damaged by the contractors during the construction of the elevated track have not been repaired in the city.

The Children’s Park at Committee Chowk, the only park for the residents of the congested localities of the inner town, is in a bad shape as the construction wastes are still lying in its lawns.

A women’s park adjacent to the Rawalpindi Development Authority (RDA) offices, which was also damaged during the construction of the metro bus route, is still under the use of one of the contractors.

The Punjab government had provided Rs1 billion to the Parks and Horticulture Authority (PHA) for the reconstruction of the parks and greenbelts destroyed during the construction of the metro bus route but the PHA failed to spend the amount on the project.

A senior official of the PHA told Dawn that the authority was busy in constructing cricket grounds in three schools in the constituency of former MNA Hanif Abbasi. He said during a visit to the city in May Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif expressed displeasure over the poor work on the construction of greenbelts under the elevated road from Saddar to Faizabad and ordered its improvement.

The residents of Committee Chowk, Arya Mohallah, Dhoke Khaba, Chittian Hattian and Chachi Mohallah said the woman park would vanish very soon as it was located in the constituency of a PTI MPA (PP-13) and the PML-N government was not interested in its repair and maintenance.

“We are being victimised for supporting the PTI in the general elections. The metro bus service was launched by the government just for its projection otherwise it has done nothing for the resolution of the civic issues in the area,” said Mohammad Jan, a resident of Chachi Mohallah.

Shahid Qayyum, a resident of Committee Chowk, said women and children wanted to go out in the evening but the parks in the area were in poor shapes.

When contacted, PTI MPA Arif Abbasi told Dawn that the provincial government befooled the residents by promising to reconstruct the parks damaged by the contractors during the construction of the metro bus route.

“The PTI will raise the issue in the Punjab Assembly and will seek a report on the spending of the money allocated and released for the reconstruction of parks and greenbelts. The taxpayers’ money was spent on the recommendation of former MNAs who lost the general elections 2013,” he said.

PML-N former MNA Malik Shakil Awan, who is also member of Metro Bus Project Monitoring Committee, expressed concern over the poor condition of the parks and said due to the presence of the construction material wastes, the parks had become an ideal place for the breeding of the dengue mosquitoes.

He said he would raise the issue with the provincial government as both the parks fell in his constituency of NA-55.

Published in Dawn, August 22nd, 2015

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