Contractors not maintaining open spaces to be fined

The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has ordered an inspection of all open spaces in the city where contractors have been appointed for maintenance.

The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has ordered an inspection of all open spaces in the city where contractors have been appointed for maintenance. Faced with criticism that the city’s open spaces are in a shoddy state, the civic body has announced that it would fine all contractors who are found to be negligent in maintaining open spaces.

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Hindustan Times had reported on October 13 how an allocation of around Rs 85crore was set to lapse, since the civic body had failed to appoint contractors in time to carry out works in gardens. Responding to this, the civic body has now said that it plans to protect open spaces vulnerable to encroachment, by building walls around those open spaces where none exist.

This comes after corporators in the standing committee, with an eye on the elections, protested over the civic body’s delay in appointing new contractors to carry out beautification works in open spaces.

The civic body had appointed garden works contractors in 2008 for a period of two years. Although their term expired in March 2010, they were given a year’s extension, which then expired in March this year. Since then, the civic body has failed to appoint a new set of contractors, thanks partly to litigation initiated by the old set of contractors challenging the civic body’s move to appoint new contractors.