PUDA starts demolition of British-era houses

AMRITSAR: A year after holding of an auction of 43 residential plots in the Civil Line area the Punjab Urban Development Authoruity PUDA has started demolition of the Britishera kothies previously belonging to the Police and the Canal Department to pave way for setting up of a residential locality

Updated At : 06:50 AM Mar 29, 2015 IST

Neeraj Bagga

Tribune News Service

Amritsar, March 28

A year after holding of an auction of 43 residential plots in the Civil Line area, the Punjab Urban Development Authoruity (PUDA) has started demolition of the British-era kothies , previously belonging to the Police and the Canal Department, to pave way for setting up of a residential locality.

The auction was held on March 1, 2014 for 43 residential plots of 500 square yard each and still there are equal number of plots left, which are yet to go under the hammer.

These plots are carved out after shifting offices of the police and other departments from already existing buildings in the proposed 24 acres of land, located opposite the Government College and close to the Amritsar cantonment.

Under the Optimum Utilisation of Vacant Government Land (OUVGL) scheme, offices of the Police Commissioner, the NRI police station, residences of the DIG and the Canal Department’s officials are to be demolished.The workers engaged also demolished three Mazaars (mausoleums) at the place.

Under the scheme, PUDA will develop two commercial pockets of 2.88 acres and 2.21 acres, respectively. An area of 0.48 acre has been kept for multi-use purpose, 0.32 acre for water works and 0.48 acre has been kept as the reserved area. Land measuring to 2.72 acres has been charted for setting up of three parks.

PUDA will hold the next auction to sell the rest of the 43 plots measuring 500 square yards each after about three months.

Earlier, PUDA, at the behest of the government, had got vacated 16 British-Era kothies from various departments, including irrigation, judiciary, the Punjab police, PWD and B&R, spread over an area of about 31 acres in the vicinity of the cantonment in 2013.

The government had taken the initiative under its OUVGL policy. As per the plan, the abandoned and surplus land of the government departments would be utilised for development but with a rider that it could not be sold.

The government has got constructed apartments for the residence of the officials of the Irrigation Department in a kothi no. 3 and the remaining area was to be used for commercial purpose. Under the plan a five-star hotel, five separate commercial complexes and underground parking lots were to be raised on the land.

However, PUDA abandoned the plan to develop the land into commercial after the Army raised objection against raising hotels and commercial complexes at the Amritsar Cantonment area.

Now, PUDA is developing the same into a residential one.

Sandeep Rishi, Chief Administrator, Amritsar Development Authority (ADA), who also looks after PUDA here, said demolition has started and would be taken up one by one. He said the buildings which would be used for commercial purposes would be demolished later as commercial complexes were auctioned after the completion of the project. He informed that it would take six more months to lay sewerage, water pipes, roads and other civic amenities.