Children and Parks

I still remember the days when we used to play on the streets. Still remember that dreaded neighbour, who would never return the ball which fell in her compound.

But some days back when I visited the locality, where I grew up, I couldn’t imagine playing cricket on the street – there was no space- cars parked all along. Almost 40% of the road space is now being used to park cars. Moreover, playing cricket or any other ball game around parked cars can damage the cars and hence prohibited. Poor kids!

But I was appalled when I read that a bunch of kids in GK actually got on the roads as they were prevented from playing in the local park. Why? Because playing in the park may ruin the plants in there. Then where do the kids go to play? The MCD, doesn’t have an answer to that although one thing is clear – Children are not supposed to play in the park.

Gradually, the expanding city is putting these questions to its citizens?

Being an educationist and environmentalist over that, I see a lot of similarities between the issue of ‘conservation of tigers’ and ‘conserving parks’. Just as throwing tribal people out of parks cannot save a tiger, similarly throwing children out of parks cannot save the parks.

Agreed, we need to have well done parks, which look good – but what is a park without any people. Actually, who needs parks anway – why do we need parks.