CHENNAI: Anna Nagar Tower Park, part of many Tamil movies of the 1980s and early 1990s, is the news now for wrong reasons. Much to the shock of visitors, a jilted lover stabbed his girlfriend and self in broad daylight. “These type of incidents (Tower Park incident) usually happen on roads. This time it had happened inside the park,” a Chennai corporation official said.
The incident at the famous park has triggered serious questions of security at parks. “Many parks in the city don't have security personnel in place. Although some parks have security personnel, they would simply open the gate and go.
They would come only to close the gates at evening,” said Augustine David, president, Federation of Adambakkam Welfare Associations.
Residents also pointed out that lack of internal security personnel in parks is also a reason for untoward incidents happening in the parks.
“The parks only have security personnel posted at gates. The authorities should take necessary steps to post security personnel inside the parks to thwart crime incidents,” C. Ramakrishnan, vice president of Federa, said.
Resident welfare associations also demanded early closure of parks as late hour closure invites miscreants. “With the civic body closing parks at 9 pm, miscreants find opportunities to engage in untoward incidents. The civic body should close the parks before 7.30 pm,” Augustine David said.
However, the civic body officials who are maintaining 525 public parks in the city remained unaware of the incident that occurred inside one of their property.
When contacted a corporation official, he was totally unaware of the incident and maintained that the corporation parks have adequate safety measures.
