NEW DELHI: Basant Lok Market, a popular place to hang out in Delhi during the 1980s and 90s, has got a makeover. Hardeep Singh Puri, Minister of State for Housing and Urban Affairs, on Tuesday inaugurated the upgraded market complex in Vasant Vihar in the presence of Lieutenant Governor Anil Baijal and Delhi Development Authrority’s vice chairman, Tarun Kapoor.
Once known for its fast food outlets, upscale restaurants, branded retail stores, and Priya cinema, Basant Lok community centre had lost its charm with the emergence of multiplexes and glitzy malls around the city. The complex, in its new avatar, has an amphitheatre, piazzas with unblemished granite flooring, well-lit parking lots, street furniture, new signage, ornamental lights with LED lamps, and digital information kiosks.
“The provision of augmentation of necessary services such as rainwater harvesting, fire-fighting equipment, and green space near the complex, were taken into account. All the vendors have been shifted. The pedestrian area and corridors have been upgraded,” said a DDA official.The market complex was constructed in the 1970s and it was once one of the most happening hangout spots in Delhi.
Priya cinema was one of the main attractions, as it used to screen Hollywood movies, which, at present, are the flagship property of PVR Cinemas.
The Delhi Development Authrority has developed 11 district centres and 44 community centres in the national capital, and Basant Lok is one of them. Poor maintenance and crumbling infrastructure in the market had resulted in reduced footfall. Following the opening of malls in the vicinity--in Vasant Kunj and Saket-led to closure of most of the popular stores in Basant Lok.
Traders and shop owners had been demanding its redevelopment for long.In 2008, the Basant Lok Community Centre Welfare Association set up a maintenance committee, which kept pursuing the matter pertaining to its redevelopment with the DDA and the L-G. The minister also inaugurated Vasant Udyan (district park) next to the complex, which has also been redeveloped.