Pune: Residents of Baner, Balewadi are up in arms against the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) after the owner of the plot, which was reserved for a garden, has requested PMC to return his land situated at Sector 1, Survey No. 35. To stop the de-reservation of the plot, the residents will be holding a signature campaign on August 5.
The members from the Baner-Balewadi Garden Reservation Save Action committee alleged that the civic body was destroying the green cover for residential property development. Ashok Ghorpade, PMC Chief Garden Superintendent, said, “We are not going to dereserve any plot or any area from the garden. The private landowner had requested PMC to return his land to him and he would be paying compensation to PMC. But we said that we cannot return the land, as that has been already reserved for garden spaces and no such dereservations will be made for any residential property development.”
Meanwhile, the committee members came together to register their objection on this dereservation on Sunday. Committee member Vaishali Patkar said, “According to the DP, in 2008, from the total area of 838.20 hectares, including the 16.69 hectares reserved for the garden at Baner-Balewadi Sector 1, which includes some part of Kothrud as well, has been dereserved in the Development Plan. This means only 8.95 hectares of garden space will be there and the remaining will be given for residential property development.”
Sarang Wabale, member of the committee and Baner-Balewadi-Pashan Resident Association, said, “We will be signing a petition. In the petition, we are going to mention prominently that the dereservation should be removed and the space should be kept reserved for a garden. Also, the authorities should give proper information about the DP and a proper map as well.”
“In short, Murkute Garden situated in Baner was reserved for a garden area and only 40 per cent of the total garden area has been developed into a proper garden and the rest is being dereserved, which will be given to the builder lobby, harming the green cover. The total area of the garden area has not been confirmed yet, but the petition will be filed requesting all the details,” Wabale
alleged. Wabale further mentioned that a mass movement will be conducted on Sunday and signatures from the concerned residents will be taken on the petition and then the petition will be given to the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) to look after the solution for dereservation.
