Residents of Hebbal Third Stage oppose MCC move as park will turn into dry waste dump yard

Mysore/Mysuru: The Mysuru City Corporation’s (MCC) plans to sort waste inside a public park in Hebbal have not gone down well with residents of the area. Huge constructions are coming up inside the park in complete violation of Karnataka Parks, Play-Field and Open Spaces (Preservation and Regulation) Act, 1985.

The park is located beside Basava Marga Foundation, Hebbal Third Stage near an educational institution and all its four sides face the Ring Road. The park is spread in an approximate area of half acre and most of the space is being taken up by the construction of a solid waste segregation unit.

Residents who spoke to the MCC engineers reveal that as per the plan initiated by the civic body, the waste collected from houses and public areas in and around Hebbal and Vijayanagar will be brought here to segregate. “Gradually, this area will be converted as a dry waste dump yard,” said residents who are opposing the segregation unit.

The area is sparsely populated and people have purchased plots in the vicinity to build houses later. “This is a small park and gradually, movement of vehicles, including garbage trucks will increase and spoil the park premises. Garbage will get accumulated causing bad odour. If segregation at source was enforced effectively, there would be no need to set up segregation units in such areas,” Vidyut Shashidhar, a resident of the area told Star of Mysore this morning. 

As per the Karnataka Parks, Play-Field and Open Spaces (Preservation and Regulation) Act 1985, nothing can be built in a park measuring 2.5 hectares. If it is larger than 2.5 hectares, less than 5 percent of the area can be used for building a dwelling for the security guard or to store park equipment and nothing else.

5-year-old trees removed

“Earlier, the MCC used to segregate waste near the High-Tension Park under the high-tension power lines. But now, that area has been declared as a buffer zone and the waste segregation plant is being built inside the park here. To mark the World Environment Day about five years ago, the Forest Department and the local residents joined hands in planting hundreds of saplings here. But now, the MCC bulldozers have removed all the plants to make way for waste segregation,” he added.

“Parks and playgrounds in MCC limits were not meant for dumping waste. If at all the civic body wants to make waste processing units and waste dumping or segregation centres, they can recover thousands of acres of its land that has been encroached upon and use it for dumping waste,” Vidyut Shashidhar said.

When the residents questioned the jurisdictional MCC engineer, he said that five percent of any park can be used for construction. “Works slowed down a bit when we questioned the logic behind setting up a waste unit inside an area that has been specifically marked as a public park. But after a few days, construction has resumed rapidly,” he added.

‘Laws have remained on paper; MCC does not care’
Environment activist and Mysore Grahakara Parishat (MGP) Convenor Bhamy V. Shenoy said that ideally segregation units should be far away from residential places. Once they start collecting waste, the area becomes unhealthy. If the MCC uses part of park space for garbage disposal, it will spoil the entire park, he said.

“We have lost many parks in Mysuru as it is the MCC that is violating rules, a classic case of fence eating the crop. The five percent construction as mentioned in the Karnataka Parks, Play-Field and Open Spaces (Preservation and Regulation) Act, 1985 is not a loophole and this is being misused by the MCC. This five percent goes beyond 40 percent in most of the cases. Sadly, the senior officers these days are not progressive and the lower-rung MCC staff are not aware of the rules,” he rued.

“How can the MCC allow such a blatant violation by its own staff? The MCC is taking people and tax-payers for granted. Unfortunately, most of the laws have remained only on paper so far and the residents are the ultimate victims,” he said.