A few years back, UIT built an area for a park by the Ayad River, near  Syphon Chaurah of Udaipur but it needed to be developed. Even after a  year of its establishment, it remained a dry, treeless plot of land. There was  no road that would make the park accessible to people of Navratna  Complex that lived nearby.  So, naturally it went neglected.  The park’s fate seemed to be in the dark. I realized I  couldn’t wait for someone to  come and save it. Change  begins with one person, so I decided to become that person.  

I am a part of an NGO named Indiegenius, and we were already doing a  project on cleaning Ayad River. That’s when we discovered this 1 lakh sq.  ft. of land that was supposed to be a park, and thought of doing something  about it.  

We approached UIT for this mission and had JCB Backhoe loader (Digger)  machines clean the space up.  

More than 500 trees were planted by us in the first year of the park’s  renovation. But around 150 plants dried out and died or got eaten by stray  animals. To tackle that, we used the thorny bushes on its border to keep  the animals out.

Another barrier in park’s survival was zero supply of water. So, we installed a tubewell that pumps water from the Ayad River. We wanted people from Navratna Complex to support the initiative. But no one was showing up. Then UIT built a dirt road so that one  can travel to the park now.

We contacted the secretaries of the Navratna Complex and made a  Whatsapp group consisting of people from the building. Sustaining this  project financially was a tough job. One donour dug up the bore well and  another installed the pipeline for water supply.  

Now, several people come and visit the park. One day, one of our  Whatsapp group contacts, who works at Secure came to the park. I asked  him if he knew someone who could provide us trees for the park. He  shared 10 lakh vriksh team members’ contact info. We connected and  Dharohar gave us 202 trees. 

Persistence, good intention and working with others has kept this project  alive despite the struggle it went through. Hopefully, this will keep going and  the park will become an attraction for everyone.