Resistance from the Srinivasapuram residents leads to incomplete restoration of Adyar estuary
Posted on: 05/Apr/2018 9:58:47 AM
The news that a part of 300 acre project of Adyar Creek and Estuary restoration by the CRRT or Chennai Rivers Restoration Trust remains incomplete in Srinivasapauram has been the subject of discussion for many. It must be noted that in this place stiff resistance from the residents against the restoration of Adyar estuary has caused this issue.
The residents of this Srinivasapuram slum have dumped garbage along the part of the creek. It is important to mention that restoration efforts done over the remaining 300 acres would be useless because garbage accumulated. Another important piece of information is the encroachments on the estuarine portion have increased.
By the month of October in 2016 the reclaimed portion of the estuary was finished and this still hangs in balance. It is now revealed that the slum people in this Srinivasapuram in Chennai are worried that they have to relocate to slum board tenements in other parts of Chennai.
It is known that the residents of this place depend mostly on fishing to make their both ends meet. Now the fear of shifting to another locality is seen on the faces of many residents of this area.
According to Bharathi belonging to Srinivasapuram, lives of many depend on the sea and shifting to another place is not possible.
There are as many as 3000 families in this locality in Chennai but only six dust bins are available. This has resulted in the dumping of garbage on the shorelines of Srinivasapuram.
To ensure increased tidal influx, CRRT had removed floating debris from the Adyar River estuary and this was before the project had started. Only afterwards the fencing was done. Over the period of time the garbage content increased in size and this was confirmed by the residents of Srinivasapuram.
An official expressed his thoughts and spoke about how the project was completed in 2016 itself but could not enter the space. Need of using dustbins for dumping garbage was considered important and word regarding this was spread to create awareness. The official further highlighted how the encroachments have grown in size over the years. It is also said that the houses have expanded to the area beyond those developed by CRRT.
