A day after a 22-year-old college student was stabbed by her boyfriend Rajesh in the Anna Nagar Tower park on Tuesday, staff at Chennai Corporation parks want the civic body to re-introduce the old timings and keep the park closed between 11 a.m and 4 p.m.
On Tuesday, Latha, 22, (name changed), a college student, was stabbed with a knife by Rajesh after she reportedly wanted to end their relationship. Later, he turned the knife on himself. The two have been admitted to different hospitals in the city.
“Latha is responding well to treatment. Rajesh has been shifted to the Rajiv Gandhi Government General Hospital as he could not afford the treatment. He told us that he stabbed her as she refused to marry him. We are waiting for his condition to become stable for interrogation,” said a senior police officer. The staff of the private hospital, where the girl has been admitted, refused to comment on her health status.
Shut parks in afternoon
Following the attack on the girl, the staff at Chennai Corporation parks want them to remain shut between 11 a.m. and 4 p.m.
In 2012, then Mayor Saidai S. Duraisamy decided to keep all the parks open from 5 a.m. to 9 p.m., to allow people make maximum use of the green spaces.
Prior to this, they were open between 5 a.m. and 10 a.m. and between 4 p.m. and 8 p.m.
“Since the premises are pretty vast, it becomes difficult to monitor the visitors to the park, as we have very few staff. Some of the visitors indulge in vandalism,” said one of the supervisors at the park.
The staff at Robinson park (Anna Poonga) had the same complaint. However, staff at Nageshwara Rao park in Mylapore said the park was closed between noon and 4 p.m., but laid stress on the need to install CCTV cameras in all the parks.
