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Anti-encroachment drive: Ludhiana MC razes 200 illegal structures in Gopal Nagar
The encroachments mostly houses, slums, and animal sheds were demolished despite resistance from residents.
In a major demolition drive conducted in Gopal Nagar (ward number 80), the municipal corporation (MC) on Friday razed over 200 encroachments situated at a 2 km-long stretch alongside Buddha Nullah.
The encroachments mostly houses, slums, and animal sheds were demolished despite resistance by residents. A heavy police force was deployed at the spot along with the building branch officials of all the four MC zones.
The authorities said that encroachments were done on-road portion and a chunk of land earmarked for a leisure valley in the area. The civic body will now take up road construction projects in the area.
While many houses have completely been razed, only the illegal part of a large number of houses, animal sheds were demolished by the MC. Residents gathered in huge numbers to demolish the buildings suspecting that the MC might damage the entire building while razing the illegal portions.
Owners of a few houses/godowns also sought time for making some alternate arrangements. The civic body officials said that another demolition drive will be conducted in the area if owners failed to raze encroachments on their own.
Assistant town planner (ATP), MS Bedi said, “The encroachments have been razed and the MC will now commence the process to construct the road. Also, the encroachments have been removed from the area where LIT has to establish a leisure valley. No protests were witnessed at the spot and the drive was conducted peacefully in presence of the police force.”
Municipal town planner (MTP) SS Bindra also visited the demolition site to take stock of the situation.
Earlier on November 2, cabinet minister Bharat Bhushan Ashu and mayor Balkar Sandhu also visited the spot and directed the officials to remove encroachments from the road portion as well as from the land earmarked for establishing a leisure valley. Ashu stated that the project to establish a leisure valley will be completed in six months.
Residents left without a roof in cold weather
Left homeless in chilly weather, the residents cried foul stating that no action is being taken against wealthy house owners and school that is situated on the other side of the stream, which is also a part of encroachment.
They said that no notices were served to them.
A house owner Amit said, “We have been living in this area for over a decade and the MC has demolished our house even when it was not established on the road portion. My family including children and the elderly are now without a roof in these extreme weather conditions.”
It is said that most of the area residents are labourers and are struggling to make ends meet during the pandemic. The demolition drive taken up by the civic body has added to their woes as even the sheds established for the livestock have been razed by the authorities.
A month after the demarcation process was completed, the MC is yet to initiate action against over 950 permanent encroachments in the form of houses, commercial and industrial encroachments alongside Buddha Nullah. During a visit to the city on November 27, the monitoring committee of the National Green Tribunal (NGT) had also directed the civic body to start demolishing illegal buildings.
