Haphazard constructions: Too late to act?

Pratibha Chauhan

Tribune News Service

Shimla, December 9

The failure of the state government in declaring the core area of the capital as a no-construction zone and checking haphazard constructions has virtually turned the town into a concrete jungle with no efforts being made to decongest the town.

The collapse of old roads and retaining walls constructed during the British regime, due to mindless and unregulated construction, has agitated residents.

What makes them even more indignant is the fact that projects are being cleared to come up on every conceivable vacant chunk of land in core areas comprising The Mall, Lower Bazar, Lakkar Bazaar and Jakhu. Strict regulations of not allowing buildings to come up on nullahs (water channels) and in green areas exists only for the common man, as there are umpteen examples where the government has made relaxation for a select few.

Surprisingly, even today Shimla’s growth and expansion is taking place as per the Shimla Interim Development Plan (IDP) of 1979. The Shimla Development Plan (SDP) prepared by the Town and Country Planning (TCP) Department almost five years ago has become redundant as it keeps gathering dust in files, awaiting government approval. A fresh exercise has now been initiated to prepare a fresh SDP, which will emerge as a blueprint for the town’s growth.

Though every regime has been harping on decongesting the town by shifting various facilities and services such as sabzi mandi, anaj mandi, coal and wood markets to the outskirts of the town, no serious efforts have been made to actually set the ball rolling.

Instead multi-story commercial projects such as the parking near The Lift and in Chotta Shimla have been approved, not realising that these would further aggravate the already grave situation. “We have to take the pressure off the roads and explore alternative mode of transport as we are already very late considering the high-traffic density in the town,” said BS Malhans, environmentalist and member of the Heritage Advisory Committee.

Residents of Jakhu, The Mall and Richmond, who were forced to take a detour of at least 4 km for a year due to the collapse of the road near the High Court, said it was time the government actually declare at least the core area as a no-construction zone.

To make things worse, the government has been adopting a very lenient view on illegal and unauthorised constructions by bringing in retention policies and now, the proposed amendment in the Town and Country Planning Act to pave the way for regularising construction violations. Developing satellite townships still remains a distant dream.