INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
Kathmandu, February 27
More than four years after the Supreme Court issued an order to remove hoardings and signboards from city areas,
Kathmandu Metropolitan City removed over 11,000 hoardings in the last two months.
The SC, on September 2015, had ordered the government to
remove all kinds of illegal hoardings, signboards and other eyesores like posters and stickers that have been degrading city
beautification.
The government had remained indifferent to the apex court order
The SC Judgment Execution Directorate had written five letters to government bodies to implement the court order.
Ministry of Federal
Affairs and General Administration on 31 December 2019 had asked all local levels to implement the SC order
Following news reports carried by THT, KMC had started removing hoardings and signboards on March last year.
This time, KMC has adopted
stringent measure to remove hoardings and signboards
It does not allow hotels, restaurants, groceries, offices or any corporate house to place even small signboards.
According to Deputy
Superintendent of Police Dhanapati Sapkota, small signboards have been cluttering the city.&We foundthat removing hoardings alone was not
enough to control visual pollution in the city
Promoters encouraged small shops in the city to place signboards.
Large space of such board was allocated for commercial products of the
promoters with a tiny fraction displaying name of the concerned shop,& Sapkota said.
Promoters are also not allowed to place hoardings or
signboards blocking windows and veranda of a building, on roof-top and on public or private land.
Sapkota also said Kathmandu Metropolitan
City has removed over 84 hoardings from roof-tops and from verandas and there are around 10 more left to be removed.
KMC has launched
discount offer to those who want to place digital signboards.
Digital signboards are comparatively smaller and do not clutter the city.
On
December 26, last year, a meeting headed by Minister of Home Affairs Ram Bahadur Thapa in Singha Durbar had decided to remove different
kinds of eyesores like hoardings, signboards, posters and messy wires dangling overhead in the capital city.
Kathmandu Metropolitan City had
formed a task force to remove visual pollutants.
But, the task force is yet to remove cables dangling from utility poles, which are also a
prime cause of visual pollution in the city.
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