Once a place to dump garbage, the corner of the junction where the road from Bharati Nagar joins Bejai Church Road is now getting a facelift as a garden.
Thanks to the initiative of Prakash B. Saliyan, councillor from Kodialbail Ward No. 30, it is the second such solution-finding effort in his ward to prevent open dumping of garbage.
The second garden would be ready within a fortnight and scheduled to be inaugurated on January 17.
It was about one-and-half-years ago that Mr. Saliyan noticed garbage being dumped in a corner of the road at Chandrika Extension.
It was developed as a mini garden with financial help from a donor.
Since then, members of the Yuva Friends of Kadri Kambla have been maintaining it even while ensuring that no one dumped garbage there, he told The Hindu .
Initially, its members physically guarded the garden to prevent garbage being dumped there.
Later, people stopped dumping garbage there, he said.
The second garden is being developed also through a donor’s fund.
“It will be maintained by a committee through crowd funding,” he said.
The garden would have two palm trees, other trees, grass lawn, water and electricity facility besides plants and saplings on terracotta pots.
A bust of Swami Vivekananda would be installed in the garden and it would be named after him by observing Vivekananda janmotsava on January 17, he said. “It pains that some people still throw garbage-filled plastic bags on the same spot even after noticing that it is being developed as a garden,” Mr. Saliyan said.
Even though garbage is being collected from their doorsteps, some people still throw garbage at open places. If all 60 councillors in the corporation took an initiative to develop gardens at road corners and junctions, open dumping of garbage could be prevented, Mr. Saliyan said.
A resident of the ward Venu Sharma said that it is the way to become smarter in a smart city. Its concept can be achieved only through such micro efforts. Organisations, youth clubs could come forward to maintain such mini gardens, he said.
