Malitola Park now a parking lot

Desk Report: A part of the Malitola Park is being used as parking lot for trucks and pick-ups, destroying the greenery inside the recreation area, reports Daily Sun.
Though the park has been made off-limits to visitors due to a facelift project, a huge portion of it has been turned into a truck stand.
As the facelift project for the park has been extended by a year due to lackadaisical attitude of Dhaka South City Corporation (DSCC) authorities, the owners of trucks and pick-ups have turned the park into a permanent parking lot for their vehicles.
The Malitola Park on the English road under DSCC ward no. 35 is a place of recreation for locals but delay in its modernisation work has made them unhappy.
The park, located along the Raysaheb Bazar- Babubazar road, is divided into two portions and one of the portions in front Chitra Cinema is now being used as a truck stand.
Other portion is located near the Zindabahar Mosque, which has also been made off-limits to visitors, showing the cause of construction work.
According to locals, ex-president and Jaitya Party chairman Hussain Muhammad Ershad founded the Malitola park in 1988, previously known as Nagar Park.
There are some instruments for children to play and to do physical exercise inside the park, which cannot be used now as the DSCC authorities have erected a tin fence around the park, they alleged. The DSCC sources said Sirajuddoula Park, Sikkatuly Park, Malitola Park and Bangshal Park of DSCC Zone-4 are brought under the project styled ‘Jol Sobuje Dhaka’ to be modernised.
The work order was passed on September 10, 2017 and the facelift project was supposed to be ended on June 20, 2018, sources said.
But due to dilly-dallying of the project officials and negligence of DSCC estate department, a portion of the park has already been grabbed illegally by the truck owners.
Talking to the daily sun, an engineer of DSCC Zone-4 said the deadline for the facelift project of all the four parks has been extended by a year.
Asked about the reason for extending the deadline, the engineer could not mention any good reason.
During the recent visit to the park it was seen that a huge number of trucks were parked, grabbing a portion of the park land. Other portion was encircled by a tin fence, making the park off-limits to visitors.
But no contractor or sub-contractor was found on the spot.
Locals alleged that ward no. 35 councillor Md Abu Sayeed freed the park land from illegal encroachers but it remained uncared for because of carelessness of DSCC estate department.
“One of my election pledges was freeing the park from illegal encroachment. I’ve kept my word as I’ve freed the park conducting drives. Unfortunately, illegal encroachment upon the park has started again,” Md Abu Sayeed told the journalists.
Talking to the daily sun, DSCC Chief Estate Officer Md Abdul Malek said when the facelift project will resume after Eid vacation, we will remove the truck stand by conducting drives.