Urban News

In a high-level meeting of the civic body held recently, it was decided that officials who have corruption or criminal charges against them should be asked to shift to ‘less sensitive’ departments in order to keep the dealings between the agency and the Capital’s property owners clean said Jagdish Mamgain, Chairman of the MCD Works Committee. The move follows the civic body receiving complaints of officials demanding bribes from property owners, he added.

The civic body had planned to remove the officials last year but could not go ahead with the plan as some of the officials were backed by politicians, Mamgain said. “Last year, certain politicians wanted to retain some of the officials, and it seemed unfair to terminate some and spare others. This time, there will be no relaxation and all 30 will be asked to leave,” he said.

The officials will be removed in a week, following which the civic body will keep an eye out for such officials. There are 150 officials in the Building department of MCD.

On Thursday, the agency also discussed that the ongoing demolition drive should focus on unsafe buildings and buildings that are more than 15 metres in height. At present, the sealing drive is targeting buildings that are sub-divided or compoundable, creating panic in MCD colonies. Subdivided buildings are properties that have been divided into two parts without taking the agency’s permission, while compoundable buildings are those which are up to 15 metres high but have been built without approved building plans.

According to Mamgain, these two categories of buildings can be legalised through a registration procedure and should hence be spared at present. “There are one lakh properties that are subdivided or compoundable. Since the MCD cannot demolish all of them, they should focus on dangerous buildings,” he said.