E-Paper
Kathputli colony project hit by construction ban, may miss December deadline
New Delhi:
New Delhi:
The Delhi Development Authority’s (DDA) much-delayed Kathputli colony slum redevelopment project will miss the December deadline due to the ban on construction activities in view of the high pollution levels in the city.
The land-owning agency said they were yet revise the deadline.
DDA vice-chairman Tarun Kapoor said, “The developer was supposed to hand over three towers with nearly 500-odd flats by December-end. But due to the ban on construction, they couldn’t complete the work. We have not revised the deadline, as there is no clarity on when the ban will be lifted.”
Laying the foundation stone for the project in April 2018, housing and urban affairs minister Hardeep Singh Puri had said it would be completed by March 2019.
A senior DDA official said, “There were issues related to unsettled electricity bills of Katputli Colony residents due to which the discom stopped electricity supply. But we got the matter resolved. But now due to the ban on construction, we can’t do anything.”
Residents say the delay in getting a house of their own has been frustrating. “There is no clarity on when we will get our own house and move from the transit camp. The project has adversely affected our lives. While some were given flats in Narela, nearly 2,800 people are still waiting to get a house of their own,” said Dilip Bhat, member of the Bhat community.
Conceived in 2009, Kathputli colony is the first in-situ slum redevelopment project in the city. But the project has been marred in controversies and court cases.
In 2016, DDA started evicting people and shifted them to a transit camp in Anand Parbat to get work started on the project. The DDA had identified 3,848 beneficiaries of which around 1,000 families were offered flats in Narela.
DDA officials say this project is important as the next 32 slum rehabilitation schemes are modelled on it. “All the other slum redevelopment projects will be taken up on a public private partnership basis. We will soon be floating tenders for nearly 14 projects by this year-end. We have completed a survey of people living in these slums,” a senior DDA official said.
