Southern States - Tamil Nadu-Chennai   

Bus shelter razed down, IMH patients suffer

By Akila Dinakar

CHENNAI Feb. 11 . Visitors and patients of the Institute of Mental Health at Ayanavaram are forced to wait in the hot sun for bus numbers 16, 20, 22, 23 C, 26, 27D, 37 B and 37C. This is thanks to the razing down of a concrete bus shelter recently, by "anti-social" elements.

The Congress (I) Central Madras District vice-president, S. Kannan, said the bus shelter opposite the institute on Medavakkam Tank Road was brought down by "anti-social elements". Mentally ill patients who come to the hospital are put to the worst difficulty as they have to wait in the hot sun to board their buses. Pointing out that no action had been taken in this regard by officials, he sent an appeal to the Chief Minister to order the construction of a shelter in the same place.

The concrete shelter constructed with the Councillor Ward Development Fund was broken at the base and the columns were smashed, revealing a well-planned scheme to remove it and now the rubble has been removed and the area neatly cemented.

When MTC officials were asked about this, the reply was that the shelter was constructed by the Chennai Corporation and it was the task of the civic agency to take care of its maintenance. They however agreed that the area is a scheduled bus stop. Officials said shelters constructed under the Councillors Ward Development Fund were done independently and not in consultation with the MTC. In several places like Vallalar Nagar and Cemetery Road in Royapuram, shelters have been arbitrarily constructed in unscheduled stops serving no purpose at all. Residents and other users of the bus stop at Ayanavaram are demanding that another shelter be erected in the same place where the earlier one was demolished.

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