BPS: Court order awaited

Property owners who have submitted applications under the Building Penalisation Scheme will have to wait for some time for their buildings to be regularised. The Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) will not "clear" any application until a final order from the Andhra Pradesh High Court.

However, the officials will sort out the applications keeping everything in place for speedy disposal once the court delivers its judgment. Applications will be categorised into individual residential houses, flats in Hyderabad. Residential apartments,and multi-storeyed complexes commercial buildings in Hydearabad.

Officials propose to dispose off, on priority, the applications pertaining to individual residential houses and flats followed by those in commercial category. The BPS applications will be cleared circle-wise and not by the head office alone.

"We have decentralised the process of disposing applications. There are 18 circle offices and each would clear applications from their respective jurisdictions," said GHMC Additional Commissioner (Planning) Mr K. Dhanunjaya Reddy.

Depending upon the directions of the High Court, the civic body plans to post the details of applications processed per day on its web site. It also plans to intimate the specified number of applicants who should go to municipal offices with documents and penalisation charges on each day. The corporation has also set the process in motion to form special teams and demolition squads to identify and demolish all such buildings, which are either unauthorised, illegal or deviated from sanctioned plan.