Pune:
Nagari Hakka Samiti (NHS) president Sudhir Kaka Kulkarni has criticised the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) for neglecting the Chikalwadi hockey stadium and demanded the recovery of money from officers responsible for several lapses.
In a letter to municipal commissioner Mahesh Zagade, he said though the PMC has spent Rs2.5 crore over the last five-six years, the hockey stadium is still incomplete.
DNA, in a series of reports (Mar 3, April 1, May 6, July 9) had highlighted the utter neglect of the PMC's newly constructed hockey stadium.
Following the DNA campaign, the municipal commissioner had set up an inquiry committee headed by deputy municipal commissioner, KC Karkar, to probe the matter. Karkar, in his report stated that the then superintendent engineers, Madhav Latkar, NN Barapatre and executive engineer Ramchandra Shelkande, had supervised the work of the hockey stadium.
The report had stated that the civic officials had not undertaken any time-bound planning of the project. Even after spending Rs1.71 crore over a period of five-six years, the hockey stadium was not ready. The report blamed the building department for poor planning and not using the funds allocated in budgetary provisions.
"Almost Rs2 crore had been spent in the last six years, but it was found that a lot of destruction and thefts had taken place at the site. Thus, the building department has failed to protect the civic property," the report had concluded.
Kulkarni, however, maintained that the report was a farce. "Though the PMC has spent Rs2.5 crore on the stadium, it has not been able to complete the remaining work and restore it. This is sheer waste of public money. The municipal commissioner has ordered to restore the stadium but the administration has done nothing about it," he said.
Kulkarni appealed to the municipal commissioner to complete the remaining work of the stadium and demanded an inquiry into the transfer of development rights (TDR) for acquiring the land for the stadium. The PMC had issued TDR for the land before taking possession of the plot for the stadium.
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