The Hindu : Tamil Nadu / Chennai News : T. Nagar exposes inaction on court order

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Oct 03, 2006
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Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu - Chennai

T. Nagar exposes inaction on court order

Special Correspondent

Several shopping plazas have little space for vehicle parking, or do not follow adequate fire safety rules "Necessary modifications or demolition must be done for satisfying norms "

CHAOS ALL THE WAY: Holiday shoppers in T.Nagar suffer due to blatant violations by building owners on Usman Road, T.Nagar. — Photo:R. Ragu

CHENNAI : Puja holidays are generally the time of festivities. But, shoppers and visitors coming to T. Nagar are today a traumatised lot.

Many of the big shopping plazas, which have flouted development control rules and constructed big buildings, have left little space for vehicle parking, or do not follow adequate fire safety rules.

Also many of the shops have either encroached upon the public space both on pavements and roadsides, putting pedestrians to a great of difficulty. A visit to the area around noon on Monday showed a huge mass of people and vehicles swarming around Panagal Park, with a small band of policemen trying their best in the sweltering heat to create a semblance of order amid chaos.

"A single policeman or traffic warden could have been deputed at points such as Brindavan Street in West Mambalam, near T.Nagar bus terminus or Pondy Bazaar to warn motorists and tell them to avoid using the Doraisamy Road subway, and generally the T. Nagar area, and give correct diversion routes to them. This would have reduced the rush of vehicles into the mire around Panagal Park," said a trader on Brindavan Street.

An owner of a car rental company in the area said the ``chaos occurred during all festive occasions. The police divert traffic in the evenings in the week preceding Deepavali, but it can be advanced and extended all through the day." The compounding problem of the area also brought into sharp focus the inaction of the Government on the Madras High Court's judgment delivered last month.

In a landmark ruling, the court quashed the regularisation of all buildings granted after the cut-off date of February 28, 1999. It said the buildings or floors constructed in violation of development control rules should be demolished in their entirety.

It directed the creation of a monitoring committee of serving and retired officials and urban activists, to cover all buildings, which were more than four floors in height. "Where the construction of the entire building is illegal, the building has to be demolished. Where an extra floor has been put up illegally the same should be demolished. Necessary modifications/demolition must be done for satisfying the norms for fire safety and car parking facilities within the building premises."

The First Bench, comprising Chief Justice A.P. Shah and Justice K. Chandru, had passed the orders on writ petitions against the Regularisation Scheme, introduced in 1999, amended and extended for three consecutive years thereafter. The court also said that the monitoring committee should also identify the erring officials of the Chennai Metropolitan Development Authority and the Chennai Corporation, and recommend prosecution and/or disciplinary action. Notices need not be issued for demolishing structures encroaching upon public places and streets, it said, adding that water and sewerage connections given to such facilities must be disconnected "forthwith."

The Bench said the CMDA must clear all pending applications within three months, and asked the Chief Secretary to entrust the pending work to two more Secretaries, in addition to the Secretary of the Housing and Urban Development Department.

Bharat Jairaj of Citizen, Civic and Consumer Action Group (CAG), which led the campaign against regularisation in and off the court, said the Group had written to the CMDA, calling for early action to convene the monitoring committee meeting. But it was yet to be acted upon.

"Here we have a clear court order and the CMDA, which had so far claimed that its hands were tied against any action on building rule violators. . It raises questions about basic capability of governance or enforcing a court order," he noted.

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