Promoters accused of grabbing playground

Statesman News Service

MALDA, Nov. 1: The Malda district magistrate, Mr Chittaranjan Das, today sought a report from his ADM on a controversy that has broken out over a playground at Regent Park in ward number 24 at English Bazaar town.Promoters have allegedly grabbed the playground. The district magistrate’s action comes following a complaint on the matter from a councillor of the English Bazaar Municipality. “I have asked the ADM, land reforms, to probe into the matter and furnish a report of the land in question and its present status as soon as possible,” Mr Das said. Yesterday, Mr Shantanu Saha, Trinamul councillor of the EBM, raised the issue of land grabbing at the board of councillors’ meeting and drew the chairman’s attention to it urging him to save the playground from the clutches of the promoters. “I have sent letters to the district magistrate and the English Bazaar MLA requesting them to save the playground,” Mr Saha said today. It may be recalled that a few weeks ago a group of promoters, backed by the CPI-M, had attempted to sell the same ground in plots at high price.A CPI-M backed local club with the help of the District Sports Association and Rotary Club of Malda had organised a coaching camp for boys under thirteen years of age, in the vacant land.Locals, club members and also the CPI-M and DYFI cadres stood divided on the issue after the CPI-M backed promoters began construction work on the ground. The former CPI-M English Bazaar MLA, Mr Samar Roy, who had inaugurated the coaching camp, said: “I am disappointed after hearing the development. We do not have sufficient playgrounds in the extended English Bazaar town. We need to save the plot of land.” Similarly, the former vice chairman and councillor of ward number 24, Mrs Sutapa Das Ghosh said: “ We are shocked at the turn of events and are planning to recover the land.” One of the present owners of the land, Mr S Ghosh, said: “The land was earlier identified as “enemy property,” but the dispute was resolved in the court recently. We bought the land through legal process.”