2 parks cleared of encroachers

Civic body to remove usurpers to save lung spaces

The GHMC has demolished encroachments in two parks in Jubilee Hills as it seeks to restore parks in the city.

Spaces marked for parks in layouts have disappeared over a period of time, encroached either by housing societies or by others.

The corporation has decided to identify the encroachments and demolish them.

Records show there are

521 parks maintained by colony associations, totalling 210.9 acres at various locations.

In many cases, these spaces are encroached by builders who have constructed commercial spaces like provisional stores, like the one in Malaysian Township.

At a few places, the space left for park is used to dump garbage. At others, community halls and mini-convention halls and swimming pools were constructed.

According to a preliminary survey, more than

200 park spaces have disappeared in the city.

Mr Vishwajit Kampati, director of enforcement, vigilance and disaster management (EVDM), said that the corporation would restore all lung spaces in phases. The corporation would restore a park per circle during the first phase.

“We have identified and restored two parks in Jubilee Hills,” he said.

He said the EVDM wing would advise the respective departments to construct compound

walls and geo-tag them to protect the parks from being encroached again. If the parks were encroched upon again, the violators would be booked for a criminal offence under the GHMC Act.

Mr Kampati said that during inspections, the enforcement wing would measure the size of the park and verify it with the records.

The corporation would also collect information from the town planning department and check layout approvals for data.

Highly-placed sources said that besides these, the city has 334 tree parks of which more than 100 have been encroached upon. Some of these have been have been reduced to half their original size.