ECR residents irked as GCC postpones stakeholders meeting

CHENNAI: Residents along the East Coast Road (ECR) are irked as the Greater Chennai Corporation has postponed a public consultation meeting on the construction of stormwater drains in Kovalam Basin without prior information.

The civic body has sent initiations to the office bearers of residents' welfare associations in Perungudi and Sholinganallur zones and requested them to take part in the consultation meeting at a private wedding hall in Neelankarai on Thursday.

When some officebearers visited the hall, they came to know from other residents, who received postponement intimation, that the meeting has been postponed to Friday. The meeting will be conducted at the same venue.

L Muralidharan of Kannappa Nagar Residents welfare association in Kottivakkam, who came to participate in the meeting riled that the civic body does such things frequently to discourage people from taking part in the meetings.

On the other hand, officials claimed that the meeting has been postponed as South Chennai MP Thamizhachi Thangapandian and local MLA Aravind Ramesh consented to take part in the meeting on Friday.

As per the plan, Corporation has proposed to make a presentation on the importance of the SWD project of the Kovalam basin for the public at large, which is being carried out under funding from KfW, the German Development bank.

It may be recalled that several residents welfare associations along ECR have been opposing the project citing that the sandy soil in the region does not require stormwater drains and project would impact the environment negatively.

Meanwhile, the State Environment Department has invited some of the residents who raised objections over CRZ clearance for the project to take part in a meeting on Friday in the state Secretariat in which Chennai Corporation senior officials will also participate.

"Two different meetings on the same issue have been scheduled at two different locations that are 15 kilometers apart, " a resident pointed out.