SRINAGAR The newly elected city Mayor, Junaid Matoo, came under sharp criticism for his comment recently that what were the wetlands needed for? in Srinagar.
Inspector General of Police Traffic, Basant Rath, said thoughts were that of a cabbage. The comment also drew flak from other netizens and Prof Shakil Romshoo, Head Department of Earth Sciences, Kashmir University.
Soon after being elected Mayor on November 6, Mattu in a press conference, said, We are not putting chastity belts around Srinagar. On a question of constructions coming up on wetlands, he said, people see the building of a showroom and not 300 people working there. We will strike a balance between development and ecology but that does not mean putting a chastity belt around the city. Wetland Main Kya Karna Hai, Chudyoun Kou Dekhana Hai (What we need wetlands for, to show them to sparrows ?).
The reporter asked him that since former CM, Omar Abdullah, had alleged that a car showroom in city outskirts was on wetland so was a construction in uptown illegally made, but as both the owners showed the papers will he go for demolishing similar constructions?
His comments of What were the wetlands needed for was seen as policy by the SMC to allow constructions even on protected sites.
On Wednesday, Basanth took to micro-blogging site Twitter and wrote: Wetlands are precious and a vital part of our ecosystem. Only a cabbage will think otherwise.
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A Journalist mentioned Mattoo in the tweet by tagging him that he was called a cabbage by Basant to which he responded: Thats fine. Hes unwell. Dont worry.
Ramshoo tweeted that Though the successive establishments have always treated wetlands as wastelands in the state but this is a brazen display of insensitivity and ignorance about these very important natural systems. I thought 2014 floods made all of us wiser about the importance of these vital systems. Given the geomorphic setup and vulnerability of Kashmir valley to floods, nature has bestowed us with thousands of wetlands to reduce our risk to floods. We all are for modern infrastructure development in the State but it has to be disaster resistant, environmental friendly and in sync with our cultural ethos. We were made to believe by the CEO before the elections that our city will be soon in the safe hands of a ‘foreign educated’ and ‘well informed’ mayor but we are very much concerned about your flawed vision of city development.
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Journalist Athar Parveez who usually writes on environmental issues wrote, Wetlands are often referred to as the kidneys of earth. They are also called the bio filters which do the same job for the earth like our renal system does for us. But the “foreign educated” Mayor of Srinagar feels that ecologically sensitive Srinagar can survive without them .
According to him, Srinagar has no Macdonalds and commercial space unlike Jammu because we don’t construct shopping complexes in wetlands. Can someone tell dear Junaid Mattu that most of the construction in Jammu city (unlike Srinagar) takes place on state land. Srinagar has hardly any state land while Jammu has a plenty of state land.
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