KMC to set up 5 new night shelters in city

Kolkata: The Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) will set up five new night shelters in the city. The shelters will come up at wards 2, 5, 36, 133 and 57.

"We are already preparing a detailed project report (DPR) to set up another night shelter at Mahatma Gandhi Road in Ward 122. It will be three-storeyed and all these new night shelters will be either two or three-storeyed.

"This will help us to accommodate more people," Member, Mayor-in-Council (Bustee Development) Swapan Samaddar said. He added that the proposal for setting up these five

shelters will be soon forwarded to the state secretariat Nabanna.

"As soon as we get the nod we will begin the process of preparing the DPR," he said.

At present, Kolkata has around 40 night shelters, of which 35 have been set up by the state government and five by KMC. All of these are single-storeyed.

Finding land for construction of such night shelters have been a tough task and to sort this issue, Sammadar had chaired a meeting with borough chairmen, borough engineers and state agencies like the Kolkata Metropolitan Development Authority (KMDA), Kolkata Improvement Trust (KIT) and Hooghly River Bridge Commissioners (HRBC) at the KMC headquarters on November 23 and had urged them to identify vacant lands for setting up such shelters.

"A report in this regard has already been submitted to Samaddar on the basis of which these five wards have been identified. They have been given a fortnight to get the selection process done with," said Samaddar.

The existing night shelters of KMC located at Chetla, Bhowanipore, Galiff Street, Gauribari Lane and Raja Manindra Road can accommodate around 2,500 people on a daily basis.