Mumbai: 2,000 Kandivli locals demand 'right to walk'

Fed up of being neglected by civic authorities and receiving hollow assurances from political parties about resolving their problems over 2000 residents of a posh township in Kandivli East poured on to the streets yesterday morning to protest against encroachment of footpaths by illegal hawkers and various other issues in the localityThe protest started at 10 am from Lokhandwala Circle near Centrium Mall with protestors holding placards raising slogans and singing songs to highlight their problemsIrked by lack of walking space for pedestrians residents of Lokhandwala Complex launched an extensive doortodoor signature campaign and collected over 5000 signatures from the locals demanding lsquoright to walkrsquo on the footpaths and other commuting issuesThe list of demands and the signatures were later forwarded to the municipal commissioner and traffic authorities The protest which lasted for over two hours saw largescale participation from senior citizens women and children alike demanding their civic rightsldquoOver 740 hawkers have taken over the footpaths on the road that leads to the Western Express Highway WEH Senior citizens women and children struggle to walk because the footpaths have been encroached by illegal hawkers And their number is only increasing with each passing dayTill date numerous accidents have occurred because of thisrdquo said Vikas Kanchan from LOTO Citizens group that organised the protest He also urged the locals to refrain from buying vegetables and other goods from the hawkerslsquoPoliticos stay awayrsquoldquoWe told every political party to keep distance from the protest as it was simply a civic problem and not a political issue All of them had given assurances but none worked to resolve the problemsrdquo said Rajesh Kulkarni a key member of the groupThe protest started at 10 am from Lokhandwala Circle near Centrium Mall with protestors holding placards raising slogans and singing songs to highlight their problems The protest concluded at the Lokhandwala Circle where the people from all walks of life gathered to voice their opinionsldquoIllegal parking of trucks buses and other vehicles is a major nuisance and concern for the smooth flow of traffic in the township The authorities are turning a blind eye despite repeated complaintsrdquo said Roy Verghese another group memberThe group claimed that the protest was apparently the largest ever held in the township wherein at least one member from the 5012 families residing in the 40 societies of the township participatedPolitician speakLocal politician and Member of Parliament Gopal Shetty said ldquoI got to know about the protest march by the residents of Lokhandwala township highlighting issues like traffic chaos illegal hawkers and truck parking in the area It has always been my wish that citizens participate in agitations focusing on civic issuesIn the last one year we have tried solving several issues and succeeded in finding solutions to many such as waterlogging at circle by building cross culverts RCC work in township and restricting MampM trucks entry on Akurli Road to ease traffic and reducing truck parking in LokhandwalaWe initiated an access road process through MampM into Thakur village Some issues are time consuming for which we have already taken initiatives to resolve them My best wishes are with the residents who participated in the march and I wholeheartedly support all the residents of the townshiprdquo said Shetty