Alottees using residential space for commercial purposes Kuldip Bhatia Ludhiana, November 12 The Ludhiana Improvement Trust (LIT) authorities have nothing to write home about in regards to their track record in taking action as per rules for illegal change of land use (CLU) of residential houses and flats, or for putting residential portion in shop-cum-flats (SCFs) to commercial use without payment of charges for CLU in various colonies developed in various parts of the city. It is an established fact that little or no regulatory measures against the violations have led to a situation where illegal change of land use has rather become a routine rather than exception in most colonies under the administrative control of the Trust. Drawing the attention of the state government to the continuing menace, the president of Council of RTI Activists, Rohit Sabharwal, has lodged a complaint with the principal secretary, Local Government, Punjab, and director of Local Bodies, Punjab. He has alleged that in most cases of violations of the terms and conditions of allotment of putting residential properties to commercial use or commercial use of residential portions in SCFs, the LIT officials were directly or indirectly involved. “If at all any action is taken against the violators, it remains confined to paper only. Amidst thousands of cases of such violations (mostly illegal CLU), follow up action has not been taken against even a single allottee till date,” he maintained. Sabharwal further charged the LIT officials with deliberately scuttling the one time settlement (OTS) policy introduced by the Punjab government for a period of three months. He said: “Under the provisions of the OTS scheme, it is mandatory upon the allottees of SCFs to apply for CLU on payment of stipulated charges if the residential portion in the building was being used for commercial purpose. However, the laxity on the part of LIT authorities scuttled the objectives of the policy and SCF owners did not come forward to get CLU regularised. As a result, the Trust suffered a huge loss of revenue while the policy suffered a severe setback.” Sabharwal has urged the government to issue directions to the LIT to conduct a survey of schemes to identify such allottees who have illegally changed land use of residential properties and SCFs. Stipulated charges for CLU be recovered from owners of such properties where CLU was permissible and the officials/field staff of LIT responsible for overlooking brazen violations be proceeded against as per law, he added.

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