Jaipur: The sprawling Ramniwas Garden of Pink City Jaipur is closed for two days to control the rat menace. The Jaipur Development Authority (JDA) is putting pesticides in the ratholes to male this garden rat free. The historical garden, which is located in the heart of the city and covers an area of 33 acres, was built by Maharaja Sawai Ram Singh in 1868. Within the garden there is the Albert Hall Museum also which was named after King Edward VII (Albert Edward), during whose visit to the city its foundation stone was laid on 6 February 1876.
But now these historic monuments are facing a threat of rats as the Ram Niwas Garden has become hollow due to ratholes and the rats are likely to affect the foundation of Albert Hall as well. The Garden is a tourist destination of the city where there are a number of eating joints and people used to feed the birds also. This has increased the population of rats here.
JDA’s garden superintendent Abdul Majeed said that there are lakhs of rats in Ramniwas Garden damaging the plants and trees here and the spread of some epidemic cannot be ruled out also as thousands of people come here every day.
“Keeping this in mind, a two -day closure of the garden has been put to control the rats here. Granules mixed with insecticide are put into the ratholes and the holes are being closed from outside. Consequently, the rats will die inside the hole, if any rat comes out and dies, it will be buried at other place so that no other living creature or human being gets infected,” said Majeed adding that after controlling the rats, Ramniwas Bagh will be developed with fresh saplings.
This exercise is also a part of the investment summit Rising Rajasthan scheduled in December this year. The cultural events of the summit will take place in the Garden in front of Albert Hall and the dignitaries would visit these historical monuments.
