Commissioner accountable for erring MC officials: Lokpal

Ludhiana: After a gap of almost five years since a complaint was submitted to lokpal by a city-based RTI activist against illegal buildings, the lokpal has held the MC commissioner accountable for recommending action against the erring officials in case they were not doing their duty properly. The activist claimed that this decision had come after five years and it would prove beneficial even for the common man. He added that he would approach the lokpal again in case the commissioner fails to take action in future as well.
The activist claimed that in 2015 he had filed six complaints and most of these were about violation of building bylaws and also about the alleged nexus between officials with encroachers. He said he had mentioned in his complaint that instead of taking action against the illegal construction work, the officials issued only challans for no compounding fee of the buildings. He also alleged that officials did not take action against encroachments despite the orders from the Punjab and Haryana high court. He said the lokpal conducted an inquiry into these complaints and after finding the same correct, appropriate action had been taken.
In the orders, the lokpal has mentioned that it is the duty of municipal corporation commissioner, Ludhiana, to see that such violations should not occur and in case the officials are not diligent in performance of their duties, appropriate action will be recommended against the authorities concerned. All complaints are ordered to be filed, the order further said.
Meanwhile, the civic officials rued that the building branch of the civic body was in acute shortage of staff for a long time and in all four zones the MC had not even a single regular assistant town planner. In the three zones, A, B and C, the head draftsmen are handling the responsibility of assistant town planners as well but in zone D not even officiating ATP is working currently. The scarcity of staff and lesser checking has resulted in high number of illegal construction work in the city. Against six posts of assistant town planners, not even a single one is available in Ludhiana. Under such circumstances it is difficult to keep regular check on the activities in the city.