Children playing on Kamatchi Amman Koil Street at the Street Play Pondicherry event on Sunday.
| Photo Credit: KUMAR SS
Kamatchi Amman Kovil Street, one of the arterial roads in the city turned child-friendly on Sunday as it was converted into a play zone devoid of traffic.Between 10 a.m. and 12.30 p.m., the stretch between Mahatma Gandhi Street and Mission Street, featured a street festival for children and families, under an initiative of the Pondicherry Heritage Festival.The Street Play Pondicherry event was meant to revive the manner of experiencing public spaces the way it was meant to be “as we transform one of the streets in the heart of the town to be free of motorised traffic and clean for children to play”.According to the festival hosts, historically as well, the streets in the Boulevard was a place for social activity where people gathered, built relationships or shared their thoughts about their world while children played on the streets without any safety concerns. Unfortunately, the streets were lost to vehicles.Children today need the chance to be outside, active, making friends, and being part of their community just as much as the previous generation did.Children tried their luck with “nondi”, a version of hopscotch, rolled rubber tyres, and played on swings.While earlier editions of the festival had seen the recreation of Eswaran Kovil Street and Muthumariamman Kovil Street, another lane was chosen this year. A team of volunteers had begun meeting residents over the last two weeks to explain the significance of a symbolic event such as street play.‘Street Play’ is inspired by Open Streets, a movement in the United States to open the streets for people to engage with their neighbourhood actively. Published - August 30, 2026 11:51 pm IST
