5 years after east Azad Nagar was regularised, residents still await development

NEW DELHI: If East Azad Nagar is an example of how regularisation can change life in an unauthorised colony, there really isn’t much to look forward to as an approved residential area. Five year after this east Delhi colony was fully regularised, residents have little to show as having changed. As in 2013, you still see a string of illegally constructed buildings along potholed roads and broken drains, over which power lines sway dangerously.

Most of East Azad Nagar was regularised in 1977, but three of its lanes, on which around 100 houses stand, were left out. After these too came under legal cover in 2013, sanitation, the residents admit, did improve, but little else. Devender Pratap Singh pointed out that even basic municipal services were unavailable. “This doesn’t look like an approved colony, does it?” he muttered, indicating the area around him.


Praveen Kumar scratched his head and said, “Cross the road and you will come to Kanti Nagar. It is an unauthorised colony. But there is no difference between Kanti Nagar and our colony. For instance, no action has been taken against illegal construction after 2013, and whenever we approach municipal officials or our councillor for help in resolving civic problems like overflowing drains and broken roads, they shrug us off, saying there are no funds available.”

The property rates, though, have gone up substantially, especially after Delhi Metro brought the train service nearby. And yet planning has not kept pace. “The colony cannot be redeveloped because it will mean demolishing many houses,” Kumar pointed out. In the meantime, all hopes for amenities such as a hospital, wider roads, schools and a community hall have been dashed. “The colony is like a ticking bomb. In case of a fire, the fire brigade cannot even use the congested colony roads,” said Anil Sharma.

Senior East Delhi Municipal Corporation officials argued that many development projects had been envisioned after regularisation of East Azad Nagar, but the financial crisis in the civic body put paid to such plans. “Now that Delhi high court has directed the state government to release funds as per the Fourth Delhi Finance Commission, there will perhaps be less financial pressure on the corporation and development work can start,” said an EDMC official.

One of the conditions for regularisation of an unapproved colony is the submission of a colony layout plan. So what happened to the layout planned for East Azad Nagar when its status was changed in 2013? A North Delhi Municipal Corporation official explained that the layout plan, created by authorised agencies, showed land allocated for parks, car parking, etc. Civic officials verified the map physically before forwarding the plan to the Delhi government. “However,” the official admitted, “most of the time there is a huge difference between the plan submitted by the agencies and the ground reality.”

That perhaps is why East Azad Nagar continues to wallow in civic drawbacks. And that is also why things may not change much for the five colonies each under the north and east corporations that are awaiting regularisation.