After removing encroachments in cellars and making them available for parking, the GVMC began enforcing parking regulations in the city.
Earlier, the GVMC has announced that after clearing the cellars of encroachments, parking in cellars will be insisted and enforced. Staff of the GVMC and the Traffic police on Tuesday began enforcing the norms at the arterial Dwarakanagar road. For many who have parked their vehicles on the footpath diagonally opposite ICICI Bank as is their wont, it came as a shock.
Tyres deflated
The Traffic police and the GVMC staff lifted the vehicles into a big vehicle and a small one and put some on the towing vehicle. Meanwhile, some GVMC staff began deflating tyres of two-wheelers. They made no distinction.
A corporation photographer, who was taking pictures and parked his vehicle there found that the tyres of his two-wheeler went flat. The motorcycle of another photographer met with the same fate.
The exercise at enforcing the parking norm drew angry protests from the owners of vehicles. They accosted the Traffic police and others enforcing it and questioned them as to why they should be punished for the laxity of shop-keepers. It was the responsibility of the shop-keepers to ensure that vehicles were parked in their cellars. It was also difficult to everyone to find someone to inflate the tyres to right pressure.
With a number of two-wheelers making a beeline for a mechanic shop near BVK College, he made a killing increasing the price from the normal Rs.2 to Rs.5.
The two-wheelers lifted into vehicles were taken to the GVMC where the owners were reportedly warned not to park on the footpath or road again and let off.
Municipal Commissioner B. Ramanjaneyulu visited the road from Asilmetta Junction to BVK College in the evening and asked people not to park their vehicles on the road or on the footpath. He asked the shopkeepers to keep some people on the job of directing customers to park their vehicles in the cellars.
