Houses being reduced to ruins, can’t be repaired due to proximity to IAF station in Faridabad

Bijendra Ahlawat

Faridabad, June 19

Residents of hundreds of houses located within 100 metres of the Air Force Station here are unable to take up repair work of their houses due to an ongoing ban on the construction activities by the Defence Department and the district administration.

The matter came to the fore after a meeting of the authorities concerned in which Neeraj Sharma, MLA from the NIT Assembly segment, raised the concern with the officials of the Indian Air Force and district administration here recently. Sharma told the officials that a large number of houses located within 100 metres of the Air Force station here were awaiting permission for carrying out repair works but the local civic body authorities were not allowing it. The civic body claimed that no construction activity could be allowed within the limit.

Suresh Tewatia, a resident, claimed that the affected residents wanted to carry out only repair works and not fresh construction. He said though the state government had permitted registration, mutation and release of power connections for the houses that had come up prior to 2012, no ban had been imposed on the repair works on the structures that were older. Alleging harassment, Ishwar Sharma, another resident, said not allowing the repair works might result in risk to the lives of a large number of residents in case the structures collapsed.

The district authorities reportedly in a similar meeting held in January this year had decided to stick to a standard operating procedure regarding the approval of repair works or reconstruction of the houses, for which a drone-based survey would be carried out.

“While the survey to detect the exact number of constructions within the 100 metres of the station premises is yet to be done, a majority of the houses had been built prior to 2012,” says Sharma. The provision of the 900 metres wide buffer zone around the station had been reduced to 100 metres in 2007, resulting in provision of basic amenities to the residents of colonies such as Saran, Ghazipur, Dabua, Odiya Colony and Kapra Colony here, said Sharma.

However, according to the district officials, the recent meeting attended by DC Vikram Singh, Air Force officials and MLA concluded that the permission was subject to a survey by the Municipal Corporation Faridabad (MCF) and an NOC from the Air Force Department. “The residents will have to apply to the MCF and permission will be subject to the survey and a NOC from the Air Force authorities,” said the DC.