Bhubaneswar, Aug. 23: Nayapalli resident Ashish Parida will now be able to take a stroll in any of the five parks in his area.

Till date, the smaller parks in Parida's area were left unattended by the administration, forcing local residents to avoid the facilities. But, such negligence will shortly be over as the Bhubaneswar Development Authority has decided to rope in an expert agency to operate and maintain the parks.

"There are around five parks that the development authority controls in our area. But, almost all are left unattended. The trees and shrubs inside the parks have grown wild because of the negligence," said Parida.

To address these issues, the agency will look after the operation and maintenance of the parks ranging from repairing the infrastructure to introduction of the new ones, that too, keeping the citizens' demands in mind.

Sources said the decision had been taken after the development authority found it difficult to maintain such huge number of parks by its own. At present, the authority maintains 65 parks across the city.

Residents alleged that while the authority focused more on the big parks such as the Indira Gandhi Park, the Biju Patnaik Park and others, the smaller parks faced negligence.

A senior official said they developed the park and later maintained those. The procedure adopted is different from what the Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation does. "Various housing societies help the civic body maintain their parks. But in our case, we have to do it on our own," he said.

He further said since simultaneous maintenance of all the parks was a huge task, it would be better to outsource the job to a single agency. "We do take up maintenance after receiving complaints from the residents. But with the agency, the work will be taken up on periodic basis," said the official.

The authority's chief horticulturist A.N. Dhar said the agency would be selected through tender, for which they had already issued a proposal. "We have initiated the process, and the agency will be selected by mid-September," said Dhar, adding that they would pay the agency for its service.

Environmentalists welcome the move of the city administration. "It is indeed a difficult task to maintain such huge parks. An agency will definitely ease the job for the authority. This will also benefit the environment as well as the residents, who will be able to use the facilities in a proper manner," said environmentalist Alok Kar.