Ghaziabad: GDA mulls making quality papers must for occupancy

In a bid to provide safer buildings to homebuyers, the Ghaziabad Development Authority (GDA) has proposed to seek quality certificate of construction from developers before issuing the completion certificate (CC) for a building, officials said on Monday

In a bid to provide safer buildings to homebuyers, the Ghaziabad Development Authority (GDA) has proposed to seek quality certificate of construction from developers before issuing the completion certificate (CC) for a building, officials said on Monday.

The new proposal is aimed to provide safer buildings to homebuyers, officials said. (Sakib Ali /HT)

“The proposal about the quality aspect of a building’s structure will be placed before the authority’s next board meeting. This certificate will need to be submitted by the developers in order to get the CC. They can get it from any government empanelled agency,” said Krishna Karunesh, authority’s vice-chairperson.

According to the officials, the next board meeting will be held soon after the election code conduct is lifted.

Detailing the plan, officials from the authority’s town planning department said that the new proposal is aimed to provide safer buildings to homebuyers.

“For high-rise buildings, there is already a provision of submission of structural design certificate that also includes structural safety aspects. Such a certificate is given by a structural engineer who certifies that the building has been constructed under his supervision and all the structure designs are as per norms. But the load bearing strength of material used for the building structure is not included here,” said Ashish Shivpuri, authority’s chief architect and town planner.

Developers say that they have no issues if the process is streamlined and made online for ease.

“We normally take up different tests for the construction material used in buildings. If the GDA can make it a simple process, we will be ready to upload the quality certificate online. But it should not hamper the construction process pending any physical verification. Such a certificate will also improve buyers’ trust,” said Gaurav Gupta, president of the Confederation of Real Estate Developers’ Associations of India (Ghaziabad chapter).

Members of the apartment owners’ association said that the proposal is a mere eyewash considering that many housing projects have been occupied without obtaining the CC.

“The state government laws say that there should be no occupancy without a CC. But there are many projects where occupation was given without the CC. So, the authority officials should focus more on compliance of CC norms and then take up steps to include more provisions,” said Alok Kumar, founder member of Federation of Association of Apartment Owners in Ghaziabad.

As regards the completion certificates, the authority in September, 2019 conducted a survey across the city. The survey found that there were 141 projects having 1,106 residential towers comprising 90,183 flats. Of 141 projects, only 27 were found having obtained CCs while some other projects having 295 towers obtained only the partial CC, according to the survey.