Delhi L-G Asks Officials To Restore Roshanara Bagh In 3 Months

Delhi Lieutenant Governor Vinai Kumar Saxena has instructed officials to restore the glory of the historic Roshanara Bagh within three months.

LG on Saturday visited 400-year-old Roshanara Bagh under MCD in North Delhi and officials to develop a world-class nursery of rare and exotic plants and flowers amongst others, on an identified 8.5-acre piece of land within the next three months.

He instructed for works to be started for the same today itself by removing the dead foliage, debris and C&D waste.

This nursery will, apart from providing about 3 lakh plants and saplings annually for plantation across the city, also provide the people of Delhi with the same at nominal prices.

Starting the works of rejuvenating a silt and wild undergrowth-filled dead lake spread over 3.8 acres today in the complex, the LG directed officials to put in all efforts to restore the lake to its past glory.

Saxena directed to dredge and clean it to a depth of at least 4 meters and ensure that it develops as a natural water body that not only evolves as a place of visitors attraction but also develops as an eco-system that sustains varied flora and fauna with a fully restored existing island in the lake.

Underlining that rainwater in itself will not be sufficient to fill the lake, the LG issued instructions to ensure that water from the neighbouring areas prone to flooding, water logging and overflows, like Roshanara Road, Kamla Nagar, Shakti Nagar, Malkaganj and Andha Mughal that fell in the catchment, be channelized into the lake through dedicated channels and pipelines.

The soil being de-silted from the bed of the lake is getting used to build a four-meter-high bund around the lake.

The LG asked for the embankment thus created to be secured and paved by utilizing the C&D waste dumped at the Bhalaswa landfill site. While this would help reduce the burden on the landfill site, on one hand, it will also ensure that the soil on the bund does not flow back into the lake.

These works should be completed within a month, he said.

On a walk through this large space, the Saxena gave on-site instructions to officials to aesthetically restore, revamp and redevelop the greens spread over 57 acres of Roshanara Bagh into an ecologically rich and landscaped garden and bring it at par with the Lodhi Garden or the Nehru Park.

Describing the hitherto neglected Roashanara Bagh situated in the middle of Katras, by-lanes and overcrowded concretized areas like Sabzi Mandi, Ghantaghar, Shakti Nagar, Kamla Nagar and Malkaganj etc. as an asset.

Saxena ordered that walkways be developed, trees are pruned and shaped, a scientific plantation in congruence with the soil and climate and landscaping be ensured so that the expanse comes up as a visitor’s site of choice for not only the people of the neighbouring areas but the entire city.

The redeveloped gardens should be replete with eco-friendly public utilities, eateries and recreational spaces, he said.

The entire revamp, redevelopment and rejuvenation work of the Roshanara Bagh complex should be completed by the end of October this year, Saxena emphasized. (ANI)