Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike likely to drop indoor stadium plan on citizens' protests

BENGALURU: The Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike ( BBMP) may drop the controversial plan to convert a public playground located along the fourth main road in Indiranagar 1st Stage into an indoor stadium, following stiff resistance from citizens.
City Development Minister K J George announced last week that the ground would be developed as an indoor stadium jointly by BBMP and Bengaluru Metro Rail Corporation.

“Nobody is rigid about it. There was a demand from some users of the basketball court that it needs better infrastructure. I will recommend to the minister (George) to drop the plan if residents do not want an indoor stadium,“ BBMP Commissioner N Manjunath Prasad told ET on Sunday . Residents also dug out a government order that called on the civic body to drop any building plans on the ground.

ET, on July 6, was the first report that citizens would launch a campaign against the indoor stadium plan. More than 200 schoolchildren from Holy Shepherd and Kairalee Niketan schools staged a protest at the playground on Saturday . This was the ground residents fought to reclaim after the civic body allowed a private cricket coaching academy founded by former cricketers Venkatesh Prasad and Sujith Somasundar to occupy a portion of it.

Apparently, the Urban Development Department had asked the BBMP to drop the indoor stadium plan five months ago through a government order dated February 25, 2016. “I am aware of this. I'll dig into the documents. If the playground is meant to be an open space, we will not bother going ahead with the indoor stadium plan.Perhaps, we will make the place neater and leave it at that,“ Prasad said.

Meanwhile, the residents' association of Time Apar tment in Indiranagar has offered to take up maintenance of the ground. “We are skeptical about anything authorities say . They should allow us, the community, to maintain the playground,“ said Sneha Nandihal from I Change Indira Nagar, a residents collective.