When the latest Covid restrictions were announced on Sunday, ordering amusement parks to be shut from the next day, two of our largest parks were chock-a-block with revellers.
The Telegraph Salt Lake did a round of Eco Park and Nicco Park hours before the gates were shut and found visitors to be making merry rather than worrying about infection.
“This is our first time in Nicco Park and we rode the toy train, carousel, boat... We would have taken more rides but it was too crowded,” said Aditya Shaw, a Class XII student from Howrah. “We have heard rumours that there may be a lockdown from tomorrow so this is our last chance to enjoy!”
Most people spoken to felt the same. College student Kunal Roy’s heart skipped a beat as he reached Eco Park as he saw droves of people walking out. “Have they already ordered a lockdown? Are they driving visitors out?” he wondered out loud. It turned out to be the regular stream of people filtering out on a busy day. Upon learning that the park would close from the next day he heaved a sigh of relief. “Thank god I came today or I couldn’t have come for weeks or months! I’ll make the most of this visit,” he said.
Inside Eco Park, no one would have guessed the world was plunged in a pandemic. Crowds swelled everywhere one looked — some on the grass with picnic baskets, some clicking pictures around water fountains... On the same flank a toy train chugged in, stopping close to the train’s serpentine queue, a tandem cycle and people strolling both ways. Distancing was a distant dream and arguments were audible once in a while among people cutting queues at the rides’ ticket counters.
“Of course I’m scared of Covid but that doesn’t mean I’ll stay cooped up at home. I’m wearing a mask and standing at a distance from the next person in the queue to get on the toy train,” reasoned Sourav Das, who had come from the Metropolitan area with his family.
A park employee, Rintu Khan, sat near the entrance with a loudhailer, asking visitors to pull their masks up to their noses. “People have come to enjoy so we are telling them as politely as we can, but I am almost constantly on the mic. Sometimes my colleagues are going over and putting on the masks themselves for unmindful people,” said Khan.
The excuse for a missing mask was usually that they were eating. “We were drinking cola and forgot to wear the masks afterwards,” said Chingrihata’s Diya Sardar when rebuked by the authorities. The park employees went over and put a mask on her four-year-old daughter.
Outside Nicco Park, people removed their masks to eat snacks and toddlers happily hung from metallic railings meant to rein in crowds, without parents raising an alarm about infection. “This is our first outing in the winter holidays. We wouldn’t have come in the pandemic but my son’s school reopens tomorrow and his friends will all be boasting of where all they went. So we brought him to Nicco Park,” said Sk Serina Parvin.
There were also tourists from out of town — Tripura and Patna — and Nicco Park had to be on their to-do list, never mind the Covid situation. “I know Covid cases are rising but we’ve come all the way from Tripura so why not just go ahead with it,” said Ankita Pal, holding an infant in her arms.
Crowd count
Eco Park footfall had dipped after December 26 (a Sunday) from 61,103 to 24,598 on the next working day (Tuesday). It kept falling to a lowest of 18,591 on December 30 but on January 1 rose to 75,975, even higher than the Christmas figure of 60,282.
Revellers walk out of Nicco Park on Sunday, many of them without masks Telegraph photo.