‘At least 40% city buildings illegal’
Even as the residents of Campa Cola Compound were given temporary relief by the Supreme Court, questions regarding illegal housing loom large over the city.
Housing experts have claimed that over 40 per cent of the population in Mumbai is living in illegal buildings. Experts claim these buildings have been built by the gross violation of FSI norms and other Intimation of Disapproval (IOD) clauses. These are clauses that the civic body imposes on builders before giving approvals during initial stages, but are flouted by builders later on.
At least 6,000 buildings in the city are paying twice the amount for municipal water, which means they are not authorised, experts claim. Many unauthorised structures are routinely regularised on payment of penalties. But, there are many more that are not yet regularised for various reasons.
According to the experts, the Campa Cola incident is a burning example of such buildings, but the exact situation is grimmer. “Why only Campa Cola Compound? What about the rest of Mumbai where over 40 per cent of occupied residential buildings don’t have BMC’s mandatory occupation certificates?” asked Ramesh Prabhu, an expert on property issues and chairman of Maharashtra Societies Welfare Association.
He further said, “What about Thane, Mumbra, Ulhasnagar etc. where thousands of unauthorised (and often unsafe) structures are disasters waiting to happen? Major surgery is required for the entire Mumbai Metropolitan Region and that will not be a bloodless and painless process.”
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