Huma Qureshi’s cousin killed in Delhi parking row: Defunct multi-level lot looms over crime scene

Residents, however, say the irony is bitter. “We have had a giant parking space in front of us for the last 15 years, but can’t park a single car in it,” said Anil Goswami, a senior member of the Bhogal Resident Welfare Association (RWA).

The shed’s once-white pillars are now streaked with grime and cracks snake on its creases. A marble black plague, installed by the mayor of the then-unified Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD), stands outside like a forgotten gravestone — lettering eroded beyond recognition.

No car has ever entered the parking lot, which was “inaugurated” twice by area councillors and ceremonially opened once later. The structure, meant to ease the locality’s chronic shortage of parking, remains a shell with missing windows, stolen pipes, and rainwater pooling inside every monsoon.

“Last year’s flood turned it into a swimming pool… It has become a haven for anti-social elements. Even the fittings have been looted,” said Monu Chaddha, the president of the Bhogal RWA.

This parking project had begun in 2010 alongside two others — one in Kalkaji and another in New Friends Colony. All three were allotted to a single contractor, with an original cost based on preliminary drawings. Later, the contractor modified the designs, increasing the built-up area by 21 per cent and pushing up the estimated cost by an additional Rs 20 crore. A total of Rs 105 crore has already been sunk into these three projects.

The MCD and the contractor locked horns over the escalation — the work stopped, numerous deadlines lapsed, and the project eventually slipped into a bureaucratic limbo. The contractor has since been blacklisted for five years. “It has been 10 years since the project crossed its completion deadline but nothing has moved since 2018. The (Delhi) High Court had even passed an order, instructing its completion in six months — that was years ago,” Goswami said.

“When (then) AAP mayor had visited the parking lot for an inspection, it was told that another Rs 10 crore would be needed to make the projects functional,” Goswami said.

The former mayor, during one such visit, had reportedly offered to provide Rs 5 crore in two instalments, given the non-formation of the MCD’s standing committee had put all financial decisions on hold for over two years — but nothing happened. Every time the matter of this parking lot was tabled, it was postponed. Similar was the fate met by the other two parking projects.

In Jangpura, where narrow lanes choke with vehicles and people’s tempers flare daily over parking slots, residents say the murder outside the half-built lot was a tragic reminder of what’s at stake. “The MCD has been in deep slumber while people are paying the price,” Chaddha said.