Not so Acche Din for Asia’s biggest IT market

Nehru Place, Asia’s largest IT Hub with daily footfalls over 5 Lakh is severely lacking in basic public convenience. Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal always talks about his dream Delhi where he always mentions clean Delhi, with more CCTVs, best security and basic facilities. But Nehru Place which comes under Ward no 89, and contributed Rs 150 crore of VAT last year is reeling under the lack of basic convenience like Public toilet, Cleanliness, Parking, Lights, security issues like CCTV and lack of disaster management equipments.

Nehru Place has over 20500 offices in 102 buildings with 5 lakh footfalls every day. There is no public toilet in this largest IT hub. Visitors and office/ shop staff faces daily issue and the major problem is with female visitors.

All Delhi ComputersDealers Association (ADCTA) officials have raised this issue in front of government and MCD many times but with no response and no solid action taken by the government. Swaran Singh, Secretary, ADCTA informed The DQ Week, “There is no public toilet in Nehru Place. Staff and visitors keep facing this issue on daily basis. Visitors use open places here and there which causes smell and is unhygienic and an open invitation for diseases”.

Highlighting other issues, Security is also a major concern in Nehru Place. CCTV has been placed in many locations but in the current situation, some CCTVs are not working. With Delhi always on the radar of terrorists, Nehru Place might be the place where they can easily strike.

Nehru Place also faces the cleanliness issue. MCD has also removed the dustbins from the market on the pretext that the terrorists might plant bombs there. As a result, people now throw their waste and litter in any place. Mahinder Agarwal, Chairman, ADCTA, “There is no single entry in Nehru Place. People can easily enter any building from so many entry points. Also there is no X-ray baggage scanning machine. It’s dangerous sign where any unattended person can easily cause loss of life”.

Recently, a fire incident happened which caused the loss of Rs 2 crore and 8 shops were destroyed due to lack of fire extinguishers. Highlighting on the fire emergency facilities, Swaran Singh adds, “There are 11 water storage well available in Nehru Place to prevent any fire emergency but they always remain vacant. There is no water facility in the market.Partners themselves call local water tankers of their personal uses. Though it’s the largest IT Hub in India, there are no fire extinguishers available in the market. Government never gives focus on fire extinguishers equipment for any emergency. We continue to raise the issue in front of DDA and other authority, but we don’t get any response from them.”