Residents of unauthorised colonies left disappointed

Why must the court just target unplanned, unauthorised colonies? Everyone who is a defaulter... should be taken to task.

CHANDER KATARIYA, resident of Keshav Nagar, an illegal settlement

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court’s direction on Tuesday to stop all construction in 1,797 unauthorised colonies received mixed reaction from residents.

While those living in legal neighbourhoods largely said the apex court’s decision will help check uncontrolled illegal construction in the city, residents of unauthorised colonies said the move would adversely impact the working class.

Chetan Sharma, secretary general of confederation of NCR RWAS, said that the SC direction will help in implementing rule of law. “It is easy to encroach on public land. Once the building is in place, it is easy to add floors because there is no supervision by authorities concerned... This increases pressure on infrastructure and ultimately, everybody suffers. Just regularising these constructions under to political pressure once they are in place is not a solution,” he said.

The federation of RWAS said that they had meeting with the Supreme Court-appointed monitoring committee on this issue last month and everybody supported the idea of checking illegal construction in city.

“There is no denying with the fact that 70% of Delhi is unplanned. And at this point of time though, it wouldn’t be practical to remove all unauthorised and unplanned colonies. But we can at least check illegal construction in the future,” said BS Vohra, president, East Delhi RWAS joint front.

“I would also appreciate if the civic agencies simultaneously emphasise on removing encroachment at roads because if the roads are wider then there won’t be any requirement for constructing flyovers. It will also curb traffic jam and pollution level in city,” he said.

Residents of unplanned, unauthorised colonies, on the other hand, raised their concerns. “It is hard to believe that the civic agencies and local police are not aware of illegal construction taking place in their areas. In fact, they are the ones who let these constructions grow and don’t take action because they are making money out of it,” said a resident of West Vinod Nagar, an illegal neighbourhood in east Delhi, on the condition of anonymity.