BBMP delegates power to Town Planning

BBMP delegates power to Town Planning

Staff Reporter
Bangalore: The Bruhat Bangalore Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) Commissioner has delegated the building plan sanctioning and monitoring powers to the civic authority’s Town Planning Department.

In an order issued on September 29, BBMP Commissioner Bharatlal Meena has said that the Town Planning Department would now have monitoring powers too, unlike before when it was just a sanctioning authority.

BBMP sources told The Hindu that the civic authority would initiate criminal proceedings against the officials who failed to check building bye-law violations. They said that the powers had been delegated to the Town Planning Department to avoid overlapping.

Earlier, Assistant Directors, Deputy Directors and Joint Directors of Town Planning Department used to sanction building plans, irrespective of whether it was a residential or commercial building.

For a high rise building, a committee would be formed, which would later sanction the plans.

After building plan sanction, the local engineers were responsible for checking building bye-law violations at the ward level.

They were required to conduct spot visit and also ensure that the building owners did not violate the building bye-laws.

There was not much coordination between the sanctioning and monitoring authorities.

The commissioner had issued the order to avoid this and has thus handed over the monitoring powers to the sanctioning authority, the sources added.