Will George Town be re-developed as per Rajeswaran Committee recommendation?

C Shivakumar

Chennai:

Is the government going to redevelop George Town as per the recommendation of Justice Rajeswaran Committee?

The locality has 80 per cent of the 150 buildings which are in dilapidated condition as per Chennai Corporation. It also has less than one per cent of buildings which are built without any violations, as per the survey carried out by Chennai Corporation.

The committee says that data from the survey carried out by Chennai Corporation and Chennai Metropolitan Development Authority revealed that most of the constructions have been made without any regard to planning parameters with nil setbacks, encroachments on the public roads, aerial encroachments, violation of average floor space index.

This would mean bringing down a majority of construction and rebuilding them again as per the norms. But it is yet to be seen whether this is feasible or not. The committee has also recommended that guidelines for redevelopment may be worked out by CMDA.

Interestingly, while calling for redevelopment of the whole area, the committee has been silent on the responsibility of the officials who have encouraged the violations, say sources.

While there is a monitoring mechanism as well as a enforcement in both Chennai Corporation and CMDA, it seems this is hardly put into use with palms of the officials being greased by the builders.

“Accountability and responsibility must be pinned down on the officials and in case of violations, the officials supervising such constructions must be made responsible and punishment given,” says T Nagar Welfare Association, which has submitted a petition to the committee to look into the illegal development in T Nagar.

Interestingly, the Association states that when comparison of the deviations as listed out in survey conducted in 2007 and the present situation would reveal that there have been further deviations.

While there is no accountability when it comes to officials, it won’t be far off when the government would further bring in amendments to relax the regulations for illegal developments.

This would result in questioning the validity of bodies like Chennai Metropolitan Development Authority and Chennai Corporation, whose duty is to monitor illegal developments.