Punjab govt to give relief for building plan, commercialisation

[Salman]

LAHORE: The caretaker Punjab government has sought a report about the functions and status of the Housing Regulatory and Building Control Authority that stands already into existence and has been approved by the cabinet and the Punjab chief minister.

This has been done to provide relief to the common man for property commercialisation and building plan. The Punjab government has further decided that the approval of private housing societies will be accorded by the development authorities concerned, as per the decision already taken in five big cities – Lahore, Faisalabad, Rawalpindi, Multan and Gujranwala.

A meeting of the committee to frame recommendations regarding various issues of commercialisation, building control, land use conversion and on the issue of master plan violations was held at the Secretariat on the instructions of caretaker Chief Minister Najam Sethi.

Adviser to the Chief Minister Zia Haider Rizvi chaired the meeting that amongst others was attended by the Local Government Department secretary, law and parliamentary affairs secretary and the Lahore Development Authority director general as well as chief executive officer of the Urban Sector Policy and Management, Lahore.

The chair, while welcoming the members, told the committee to workout modalities and commendations to provide maximum relief within law to the general public.

The chair directed the committee members to formulate their recommendations on issues of housing societies, educational institutions etc approved by the TMAs, UCs and CDGL in violation of master plan from time to time with future course of action regarding such schemes.

They were also asked to recommend on how to ensure compliance of master plans in the future, and on issue of building control by different authorities, besides ways to avoid complications and overlapping through creation of a single authority.

They were also asked to give their recommendations on how to review the possibility of extending date of prohibiting temporary/annual commercialisation.

Meanwhile the following TORs of the committee were deliberated in detail and committee concluded:

i) The implementation of the recommendations illustrated in the master plan of Lahore is mandatory to be followed by all the departments.

ii) A sub-committee – comprising cooperative secretary, LG & CD Department secretary, Finance Department Special Secretary, Lahore Development Authority director general and LDA chief metropolitan planner – is consulted to deliberate upon the issues of Cooperative Housing Societies and suggest recommendations.

iii) The conversion maybe allowed to be recovered in a period of two years, as decided by the chief minister. In this regard, a proposal is to be submitted by the LDA DG.

iv) The LG & CD Department, LDA and CDGL secretaries after joint meeting may evolve SOPs for effective implementation of the master plan.