Stepping up its act against illegal constructions, the Bhubaneswar
Development Authority (BDA) began tearing down another commercial
complex in the heart of the city on Saturday.

The Enforcement Wing
of BDA began demolition of top two floors of a four storey garment shop
in Unit III along Janpath. BDA had declared the two floors illegal as
the building plan was not approved.

Originally, the shopping
complex had approval for the ground and first floor. But, the second and
third floor were constructed in 2008, allegedly without the approval of
BDA.

According to sources, BDA had filed a case against the
illegal expansion by the shop owner in 2008 itself. Following which a
case had been filed before the Orissa High Court which later gave the
BDA a go ahead.

Since then BDA had issued notices to the owner of
the garment shop to vacate the premise, but to no avail. When the
demolition began on Saturday morning, the shop owner Manikchand
Maheswari said that he has not received any notice from the BDA.

“This
is shocking for us, we had no clue this would happen and that the top
two floors were illegal,” said Maheswari. The shop owners reportedly pay
a monthly rent of `2.40 lakh per month to the buildings owner,
Subhranshu Samantray.

Enforcement officer of BDA Debaprasad Das
said that the case against the garment shop has been going on since 2008
and all the parties involved are well aware of the illegality of the
structure.

BDA, he said, has identified 32 more commercial
complexes in the city, which violate BDA(Planning and Building
Standards) Regulations – 2008 and action will be taken against them.

BDA had begun demolition of a five-storey building which was under construction in Ashok Nagar last month.

But
demolition had to be stopped after the building owner got a stay order
against the demolition from the High Court, one week after the
demolition began.