Rajasthan government is constructing a world-class city park worth Rs 100 crores in the heart of the coaching hub in Kota city to keep coaching students de-stressed and promote eco-tourism. The city is all set to get this new ‘state-of-the-art’ park in the new year.
Kota is known for alluring over 1.75 lakh students from all over the country for coaching of medical and engineering entrance examinations including IIT-JEE and NEET but the city lacked adequate recreation for the student population. As stress among the students has remained a cause of concern in Kota in the past, the Rajasthan government is now developing a world-class city park with an investment of Rs 100 Crores to keep students de-stressed.
The park is being constructed on over 71 acres of land of the closed public sector undertaking unit of government of India named Instrumentation Limited which witnessed shutdown a couple of years ago.
On the lines of Madrid’s Retro Park and New York’s City park, the Rajasthan government is constructing ‘City Park Kota’ through its local self-body named Urban Improvement Trust (UIT) Kota.
The city park development works started off more than a year ago and are now reaching their completion. The Urban Development and Housing Minister of Rajasthan Government, Shanti Kumar Dhariwal, who also hails from Kota, told that “With 74% green cover and 50k trees and plants, the City Park will have amusement structures for the students including leisure trails, art gallery, Egg shape Aviary with foreign species birds, amphitheatre, Art hill, botanical garden, Kinetic rotary tower, Star Plaza fountain, Disc fountains, Plafood court, open gyms, musical fountain, Jogging Track, Volcano structure, Science Garden, Punting canals, Duck pond, Wi-Fi cyber zone and Shrub garden.”
Nearly 16% area of the park will have water bodies including ponds and canals while only 12% area will have permanent concrete structures which also will be environment friendly like amenities for students, elderly people and tourists. Wi-fi cafes, Inverted pyramid, Food Arena, Play zone for children will attract students and tourists, ‘Knowledge is freedom’ statue and ‘Statues of Scientists’ will also motivate the students, said Dhariwal.
The City Park Kota will up the environment quotient of the coaching hub and keep the temperature under control in nearly 8 km periphery in the summers in this desert state town.
The Officer on Special Duty, UIT, Kota, RD Meena asserted that “Kota coaching drives the economy of Kota and students and their parents visiting Kota are tourism ambassadors so when these new development projects would be developed in Kota then Kota will be known as a tourist destination”.
He said that 80% work of the city park has been completed and the park is all set to get ready by April-May this year.
Famous architect, Anoop Bartaria has designed the City Park. Bartaria informed that since a large number of coaching students arrives in Kota so the central park has been designed in such a way that it will also de-stress students.
Director, Allen Career Institute, Naveen Maheshwari said that there was no major park or recreational facilities for the students in the coaching hub so City Park will not only develop recreational facilities for the students but will also promote ecotourism in the town.
Since the city park is located in the coaching area of the city so students also appear excited about the under constructed city park. One coaching student Madhavi Sharma said, “We are eagerly waiting for the city park to complete so that we can visit it and have fun”.
