NEW DELHI: The Lok Sabha on Friday unanimously passed the Delhi Laws (Special Provisions) Bill, 2006, which seeks to put a yearlong moratorium on the ongoing demolitions and sealing of illegal buildings in the capital.In a rare departure from procedure, which Speaker Somnath Chatterjee said should not be treated as a precedent, the Bill was introduced, considered and passed in just over an hour in view of the urgency of the matter. Lakhs of residents faced displacement following Supreme Court orders.

Introducing the Bill, Urban Development Minister S. Jaipal Reddy said the Government needed at least a year to finalise the norms, policy guidelines and feasible strategies to deal with the problems of unauthorised development vis-à-vis mixed land use, construction beyond sanctioned plans, and encroachment by slum dwellers, hawkers and street vendors. Hence the Government decided to make special provisions to maintain status quo as on January 1, 2006, for a year from the date of notification of the Bill to protect unauthorised development from punitive action.

Later, responding to a short discussion, Mr. Reddy said the Government would earnestly work towards providing at least one lakh dwelling units over the next couple of years to ensure in situ location for at least some of the slum dwellers.

Initiating the discussion, Vijay Kumar Malhotra (Bharatiya Janata Party) said the Bill was a case of "too little, too late." Accusing the Government of criminal negligence, he said the Bill would not stand judicial scrutiny. Instead, it should bring introduce an amnesty plan, on the lines of the Voluntary Disclosure of Income Scheme, to regularise illegal structures.

Sajjan Kumar (Congress) said the BJP had no right to accuse the Congress-led Government of delaying action as it had dragged its feet on the matter when in it was in power. He, however, did concede that successive governments failed to meet the growing demand for space, resulting in the prevailing situation.

Others who spoke included Hannan Mollah (Communist Party of India-Marxist), Devendra Prasad Yadav (Rashtriya Janata Dal), B.K. Tripathi (Biju Janata Dal) and Prabhunath Singh (Janata Dal-United). While making out a case for protecting the interests of slum-dwellers, they said the current stalemate was the result of lop-sided development, which forced villagers to migrate to cities in search of greener pastures.

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