Civic body in dock: Villagers challenge demolition

  • | Friday | 12th October, 2018

We have been warning these property owners from time to time, telling them they were in a no-construction zone. She said: “I have also sought a copy of the Punjab and Haryana high court orders based on which the Zirakpur MC claims to have demolished nine structures. Confronted, the DC said: “This will be clear once we get detailed report of the buildings and the basis for demolition. If it is verified that the buildings were approved indeed by the MC, then under the Punjab Municipal Act, these cannot be called illegal. We had also asked them to produce legitimate papers, failing which they must face action.”

MOHALI: With the Zirakpur Municipal Council being accused of carrying out “illegal ” demolitions around the airbase at Bhabat village, deputy commissioner Gurpreet Kaur Sapra has asked the MC executive officer for details of this campaign.Sapra wants to send the EO’s report for legal opinion before taking any decision. She said: “I have also sought a copy of the Punjab and Haryana high court orders based on which the Zirakpur MC claims to have demolished nine structures. The EO will also give me a map of the demolition area, which marks all the construction within 100 metres of the boundary wall of the defence installation (the airport).”Affected residents confronting police during a demolition drive outside the Air Force grounds at Bhabat village in ZirakpurShe said she had sought detailed reports from Gmada (Greater Mohali Area Development Authority), drainage department, and forest department as well about their stakes within this 100-metre radius.DC came to know that owners of the nine structures demolished on Monday had reportedly been paying property tax to the MC for the past four years before the assets were declared illegal all of a sudden. They claim that the MC never informed them in these four years that their structures were illegal.The owner want to know that if the construction was illegal, why then the MC passed the building plans and registered the property. Confronted, the DC said: “This will be clear once we get detailed report of the buildings and the basis for demolition. If it is verified that the buildings were approved indeed by the MC, then under the Punjab Municipal Act, these cannot be called illegal. I will look at the report and forward it to the finance secretary.”The MC officials who carried out the demolition said they were bound by the high court orders and all the affected owners had received prior notice even earlier. EO Manvir Singh Gill said: “What we did was court’s orders. We have been warning these property owners from time to time, telling them they were in a no-construction zone. We had also asked them to produce legitimate papers, failing which they must face action.”

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