Posters spoil animated wall paintings in city

Tribune News Service

Bathinda, November 17

The Municipal Corporation of Bathinda (MCB) has started painting walls with slogans of cleanliness under the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan ahead of the 2019 swachhta survey. The old animated paintings on the walls of schools, colleges and bridges under the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan for the beautification of the city have been defaced.

Earlier, the MCB had spent Rs 11 lakh on the animated wall paintings under the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan.

Posters of politicians, religious functions and private institutes have been pasted on the animated walls outside Government Rajindra College, but the MCB has not dared act against the violators. This soft approach of the civic body has emboldened people to continue with this wrong practice.

It’s not just the animated paintings on walls, but the defacement of other public property is also going on.

Shahbaz Singh, a city resident, said, “If the MCB cannot take care of the animated walls, what was the need to spend such a huge amount on getting these walls painted.”

He demanded that strict action should be taken against the violators. If once action was taken, then nobody would dare deface any wall in the future, he said.

Another resident Monika Garg said beautiful paintings were made on walls, which carried a social message. Now some people had defaced the walls by pasting posters on them. If the MCB was planning to spend money on them, this time they should ensure that walls are not defaced.

Mayor Balwant Rai Nath said nobody would be allowed to deface any wall and strict action would be taken against the violator as per the law.

It is pertinent to mention that installing hoardings and pasting posters on public property are a violation of the Punjab Prevention of Defacement of Property Act, 1997, as well as the orders of the High Court.

In the past, when a private company defaced these walls, Sonu Maheshwari, president of the Naujawan Welfare Society (NGO), had lodged a complaint against the firm.

He had met the Joint Commissioner after which he, along with the Superintendent, had gone to the Kotwali police station and lodged a complaint against the firm, but the issue was later resolved.