ZIRAKPUR: Residents will stop paying property tax from October, if the municipal council keeps denying them basic civic amenities. The representatives of various resident welfare associations (RWAs) shared this and a 100-point agenda with the media on Sunday here.They alleged that they had raised the matter via memorandums, letters, e-mail and the social media many times but the municipal council had not demonstrated any will to solve their problems and provide them with a clean environment.The issues they raised were of garbage, roads, sewerage, street lights, stray cattle, poultry farms, encroachment, no-objection certificates (NOCs) to builders, traffic lights for Singhpura, and firefighting system.Entire Zirakpur's garbage lifting system is in a mess. Every alternate day, residents face a hard time because the services of garbage collectors is becoming irregular, which has increased environmental pollution around localities. The dumpsters are not emptied and cleaned regularly. Flies, insects and stray animals feed on the overflow. The scattered garbage, a vast amount of which is discarded plastic, chokes the sewer lines.Potholed roads have made driving in Zirakpur dangerous. The VIP Road, Highland Marg, Gazipur road, Nangla road, old Ambala road, and other surfaces are hardly motorable or even fit for pedestrians. Accidents are common on these paths, because of potholes and broken stretches.Lack of sewerage and storm-water drainage has also become a major concern for Zirakpur. Streets turn rivers in just an hour of rain. Inadequate street-lighting in most areas has created safety fears after dark. Anti-social elements have taken advantage of the situation and targeted women. Stray cattle rule the streets. These cows and buffaloes are hard to pick on the dim-lit streets during night, which causes many road accidents. The poultry farm at Nangla has created serious air and water pollution near Ascon Arena. Punjab Pollution Control Board has issued closure notice to the farm, since it has put human life in danger, violated the National Greet Tribunal rules, and not received the 'pollution-free' certificate.People have built illegal houses and shops over public land in Zirakpur. Rampant encroachment is a big reason for regular traffic jams. The Zirakpur MC has sanctioned construction projects without reality check. The benefitting builders have not fulfilled the rules. For want of traffic lights on the Singpura section of the national highway, many accidents happen there every day.Also, hardly any residential society in the town has adequate firefighting system. On June 4, the residents of Ascon Arena, Maya Garden City, Savitri Greens, and Nagla village had marched till Singhpura crossing on the National Highway-21 to demand shutting down of the poultry farm.

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