Hyderabad: Civic chiefs told to tear down buildings

Hyderabad: The State Government has decided to crack the whip against illegal constructions and unauthorised layouts which are mushrooming under the Hyderabad Metropolitan Development Authority (HMDA) limits. This includes apartments and gated communities in its jurisdiction.

In a recent survey conducted by the HMDA, the authorities identified many unauthorised layouts and constructions in Shankarpally, Shamshabad, Medchal and Ghatkesar zones.

Ghatkesar tops the list in the illegal layouts. It covers seven districts, including Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC).

Officials said that in some cases, the builders were taking up constructions by quoting the erstwhile gram panchayat permissions which are not valid to construct multi- storied buildings. The builders had evaded crores of rupees of property taxes to the municipal authority.

All the 40 Municipal Commissioners under the HMDA jurisdiction have been asked to conduct field visits and prepare the list of illegal constructions as well as unauthorised layouts.

The officials were directed to verify whether the builders got valid permissions or not. If the structure was found unauthorised, the officials have been given powers to demolish them as per the provisions of the Telangana Municipal Act 2019 and action taken report should be submitted to the government on December 30 this year.

State Special Chief Secretary to Municipal Administration and Urban Development Arvind Kumar warned the Municipal Commissioners of serious action if they failed to check the illegal structures in their jurisdiction. Officials said that the illegal structures and layouts were causing huge revenue loss to the HMDA. The authority has estimated that the government incurred a loss of Rs 100 crore every year due to mushrooming of the illegal structures. It may be mentioned here that the High Court also took serious note of the growing illegal structures and the government's failure to check the illegal constructions by the developers.