BMC zeroes in on illegal constructions

The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has now decided to take stringent action against the illegal constructions. In the last 10 days the BMC has removed 2,719 illegal encroachments.

Civic chief Subodh Kumar already warned all the officials that they should not tolerate illegal encroachments. Recently, action was taken against two employees who failed to remove encroachments in their wards. Shiv Sena corporator Minakshi Patil lost her post after the court disqualified her for illegal construction.

Consequently, the encroachment removal squad also decided to act against the encroachments. In last month the encroachment removal departmental had demolished 5022 illegal constructions, whereas in April 2010 the same department had removed only 1757 encroachments. The action against illegal hawkers was also initiated by the BMC with full swing. In last one month the BMC removed 19,681 hawkers from footpath.

"The BMC would not be able to take action against the encroachment during monsoon as there are other monsoon related works begin and the staff gets busy with it," said Chandrashekhar Rokade, deputy municipal commissioner (Encroachment removal).

"Even the staff could not remove or demolish encroachments like slums during monsoon on humanitarian ground. So the actions will be taken quickly before the monsoon," he said.