Taking serious note of illegal constructions in the city, the local bodies department has issued a warning to Ludhiana municipal corporation to ensure that no construction takes place without a building plan approval. In this regard, a letter has been issued to the officials for compliance.
In the letter addressed to the MC, it has been instructed that notices should be issued in case a building is constructed without a building plan approval. It should be mentioned whether the building can be regularised after taking charges or not. Along with details in writing, photos of the said building should be taken. Besides, the officials will maintain digital record about all three activities and daily data on challans should be uploaded on the challan management system.
On many occasions, instructions have been issued to officials, cautioning them against illegal buildings. The officials, however, blamed manpower shortage for not being able to check buildings on regular intervals. There are lesser employees for carrying out checks in various areas.
Requesting anonymity, officials claimed that many complaints on illegal constructions land up every day. Many complaints are with the chief vigilance officer of the local bodies. Recently, a few building branch officials were also issued show-cause notices. He said the complaints come from RTI activists and it is quite disturbing that the employees keep their eyes shut towards irregularities. He said the government has issued these instructions to ensure compliance of court orders in some previous cases.
Notably, initially there was very poor response to online building plan approval, but the response has got better with officials discarding manual application process.