The Times of India             05.06.2013

Civic body seals building as crackdown continues in Madurai

MADURAI: Crackdown on building violators continue in Madurai as the city corporation sealed an upcoming shopping complex on Tuesday while the district collector conducted an inspection in Melur municipality to find out if the buildings had violated the norms.

Collector Anshul Mishra, while sternly warning the violators, has also instructed the officials to conduct a thorough survey of the buildings in Melur, to ascertain if they had adhered to norms. Mishra, who walked down for nearly one km along the busy road in Melur, inspected an under-construction building on suspicion. His suspicion came true as the structure was being raised on more than it was permitted to build. He immediately ordered the work to be stopped. An official team has been constituted to look into the building violations in Melur.

Meanwhile, in the city, the corporation authorities visited Raja Mill Road and sealed a building for a series of violations. The owners of the building, an upcoming shopping complex, had obtained permission for raising the structure on 1,981 sqft including the basement and first floor. But the officials found out that it was being built for 6,480 sqft. Besides the violation on space, the owners have also built the second and third floors for which no permission was obtained. "Yet another violation is breaking the nine-metre height rule. No building shall be constructed above nine metres in the proximity of the Meenakshi Amman Temple. The basement, which was ought to be a parking lot was converted as godown," corporation commissioner R Nandhagopal said.

The action comes in the wake of the civic body as well as the district administration initiating severe action against several such buildings that have violated the norms.

The Hindu                05.06.2013

Yet another building sealed in city

Two additional floors built without Corporation approval.

There appears to be no let-up in the crackdown on illegal and unauthorised constructions in the city as the Madurai Corporation sealed a building on Raja Mill Road on Tuesday.

M.Rakkappan, Chief Town Planning Officer (CTPO), said the building with survey numbers 1214/1 and 1214/2 on Rajah Mill Road in Zone-4 (near Mangayarkarasi School, Maninagaram) was being built in gross violation of the specified built-up area and the number of floors.

“Building owners V.Balamurugan and V.Maheswaran got the plan approval for constructing the basement, ground floor and the first floor with a total area of 2,981 square feet. But they constructed 6,480 sq ft. Another serious violation was that they had constructed two additional floors without the Corporation’s approval,” he said. Mr.Rakkappan pointed out that the height of the building was 12 metres which was in stark violation of the rules. The height of the buildings should not exceed nine metres within one kilometre radius of Sri Meenakshi Sundareswarar Temple.

Yet another violation noticed by the inspection team was that the basement of the building, which was meant for parking, had been converted into a godown for commercial purposes without the permission of the Town Planning Wing.

“We will continue inspecting illegal constructions in the city. In the last two months, more than 10 buildings were sealed and the public can pass on information to the Corporation if they notice unauthorised buildings,” the official added.