Deccan Chronicle 22.01.2010

Understaffed CMDA fails to detect violations

Jan. 21: Burdened by the plan approvals crowding its counters, the Chennai Metropolitan Development Authority (CMDA) had, in August 2009, shrugged off the responsibility of issuing planning permissions in the sensitive Coastal Regulation Zone (CRZ) and Aquifer Recharge Zone areas within the metropolitan limits to St. Thomas Mount Panchayat Union and Shollinganalur town panchayat, where the localities fall. However, experts doubt these local bodies would be able to sniff out violations, given the sheer lack of manpower and technical expertise that they are plagued with.

In St. Thomas Mount Panchayat Union for example, that includes 25 villages, including the posh Neelangarai and Kottivakam, the posts in the planning section have been lying vacant more than a year now, and the cashier of the Union has doubled up as the ‘officer’ to oversee the department. “Even when we get complaints about violations, we are not able to follow them up properly, simply because our staff is already burdened with the routine work in the Union,” admits an official at the panchayat union office in Chitlapakkam. The employee who performs the ‘double-duty’ does not get paid extra for the additional work, he points out.

Though the officials cautiously maintain that the violations are mainly of the setback (the open space between the front, rear or sides of a plot and the street alignment) kind, builders say that there are flagrant Floor Space Index (FSI) violations in these vulnerable areas as well. “It is mainly the independent houses and small builders that are flouting the norms. The impact of these violations is felt especially during the monsoon, when the areas suffer from excessive flooding. The traffic situation also becomes worse because of this,” explains Mr Prakash Challa, vice- president, Confederation of Real Estate Developers if India.