Need to wake up early

The recent demolitions by the enforcement staff of the UT Administration at Kajheri village have once again underlined the need for stricter periphery control. As in Raipur Kalan earlier, the action at Kajheri was resisted by villagers. Finally, the bulldozers swung into action only after the accompanying police party resorted to a mild lathi charge. Two days later similar demolitions by the enforcement staff of the Haryana Urban Development Authority in Mansa Devi Complex, near Chandigarh, also created tension. The UT Administration has explained that only illegal and unauthorised constructions on or after January 1, 1998 have been pulled down. But does that mean that all constructions before the cut-off date are legal and will not be pulled down? Should some people move court, it remains to be seen if such a cut-off date would pass legal scrutiny.

The people whose houses have been pulled down have complained that they were never warned of impending action. The Administration, however, insists that notices were given to them. Apparently, the officials did overlook housing structures when they were in the initial stage of construction. In many cases, houses, which have come up illegally, managed to get water connections from the village. They were also availing electricity through kundi connections. A few of them even had telephone connections. The officials who were responsible for the violators getting such facilities should be identified and punished. This would ensure that officials don’t disregard such an unlawful activity in future. This would obviously help avoid pangs of demolition and its aftermath. The UT Administration needs to tighten its system of blocking illegal construction activity at the first stage itself.

But violations in Kajheri and Mansa Devi are only the tip of the iceberg. For the past three decades failure to enforce the Periphery Act have confounded the problem in and around Chandigarh. The Union Ministry of Works and Housing made an effort in the 1980s to make the states of Punjab, and Haryana conform to an Inter-state Chandigarh Regional Plan, but without success. Four years ago, following objections of the Union Government, Punjab gave up its plans to build a new city on the outskirts of Chandigarh, but illegal and unauthorised construction activity has continued all around the Union Territory. In most cases, the state governments have even announced their intention to regularise the violations. All this is bound to further burden the basic services in UT. Before the Chandigarh region is dotted with unplanned hamlets to become a monstrosity of sorts, the Union Government should intervene and make the states of Punjab and Haryana see reason. They could be persuaded to check all construction in theimmediate vicinity of the Union Territory and instead plan new townships outside of the 40 km radius of Chandigarh.