Kundapur:  Substandard work - Park at Trasi beach damaged by surging sea

Silvester D’Souza
Daijiworld Media Network – Kundapur (SP)

Kundapur, Jun 20: The monsoon which continues to hit coastal Karnataka since the last few days has been inflicting heavy damages on agricultural and other properties. At the same time, the surging sea is giving anxious moments to those who live in close proximity.

Incessant rain that the region has been receiving since Monday has made the sea turbulent. Waves which lash the seashore have consumed a part of a park set up at Trasi beach by tourism department.

The beach has been a major tourist attraction of the district, and it was seen that the sea, in addition to destroying a major portion of the park, has been swelling further.

This beach was constructed by the tourism department about four years back. It was made more attractive by improving the looks and providing interlocks. Revetment and interlocks in a portion of the park have been swallowed by waves during the last some days.

Byndoor MLA, K Gopal Poojary, visited the spot on Tuesday June 18, and verified the damage inflicted by sea erosion. On Wednesday, revenue officer, Shankar Shetty, gram panchayat president, Vanita Naik, and an engineer of Nirmiti Kendra, which had built the park, visited the park.

The Nirmiti Kendra had provided the revetment, which looks beautiful from a distance. The fact that thin stone slabs were neatly arranged without reinforcing them as revetment, has caused the present incident.

The workmanship of Nirmiti Kendra has come in for strong criticism from the locals. People have been terming the revetment unscientific. They question the propriety of Nirmiti Kendra in providing a thin revetment to the park, even after noticing that huge boulders have been stacked on the seashore to stop sea erosion nearby. They have expressed anger at the negligence of the Nirmiti Kendra in not taking enough care to make the revetment safer, thereby causing huge loss to the exchequer.