Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) is coming up with an innovative plan for simplifying the process of issuing building permissions under town planning section from February 1, GHMC commissioner Somesh Kumar said. The GHMC is planning to hold building committee meetings at zonal level to clear the building permissions at the earliest, he added.

Speaking to reporters after Prajavani programme here on Monday, the commissioner said that building permission applications will be received online by providing space to upload the information and applications will be received on trial basis from January 20 to 31.

The officials will be trained in this regard and it will be easier for tracing the application where it is pending more than prescribed time in Citizen Charter and the concerned officer will be fined of Rs 50 per day for delaying the file.

The commissioner further added that it will prevent the repeated visits of applicants for submission of particular documents and hoped that there will be a very big difference and enable the applicants question the delay.

He said that the applicant after submitting the file online will receive a message from the GHMC that his application has been received and will be sanctioned in a given time and the citizens can obtain the progress of the file online as where the file is pending and causes for delay. The senior officials of MAUD have reviewed the town planning online system, appreciated the process and also given certain suggestions.

Applicants or common citizens can use toll free number of GHMC 24/7 call centre 155304 for any grievance related to GHMC. He said that GHMC is trying to create awareness among the citizens about the GHMC call centre and till date GHMC is getting 300 odd grievances per day.