GUNTUR: Tenali’s civic body has decided to take up beautification works and is inviting NGOs and young artists to paint the city walls with theme-based subjects. The civic body officials will also remove unauthorised hoardings and banners in order to make Tenali ‘poster-free’.
Popular for art and culture, the municipality is often referred to as ‘Andhra Paris’. Artists have been engaged to paint murals and popular quotations by famous leaders like Mahatma Gandhi and Swami Vivekananda.
Walls of government offices, canal bunds, flyovers and those erected on Bose Road and VSR and NVR College Road have become something like an open-air gallery as artists treat them as their canvas and paint murals and quotations to inspire passers-by. NGO Kalpavriksha has been assigned the task of painting murals at selected areas in the town.
Aman Jain of Kalpavriksha said his organisation is very happy to take up the job, adding that the public has been responding positively. Awareness campaigns on cleanliness and sanitation are also being organised at city schools and colleges. The officials concerned have decided to punish the offenders who instal unauthorised hoardings and banners.
MHO BV Ramana said the civic body was directed by Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu to take proper measures for cleanliness of the municipality, following which the officials came up with a plan for city beautification. They also decided to punish the institutions, commercial establishments and individuals who set up unauthorised hoardings and pasted posters on walls, he said.
Civic body chief K Shakuntala said 20 notices had been served to businesses and traders of Tenali for violating norms set by the municipality after it held awareness programmes.“We are aiming to make the town poster-free and plant saplings under the Vanam Manam programme,” she said.