HC panel sought urgent meet on safety, govt yet to respond

CHENNAI: After the June 28 Moulivakkam building collapse, senior members of the high court-appointed monitoring committee of the Chennai Metropolitan Development Authority demanded an emergency meeting. However, the government is yet to respond to the letter sent on July 7, a week after the tragedy in which 61 people died.
A senior monitoring committee member said the letter was sent to CMDA vice-chairman Mohan Pyare and a copy sent to chief secretary Mohan Verghese Chunkath seeking immediate reply.“We demanded the meeting in seven days considering the huge death toll from illegal structures. But there is no response from the government even after 14 days. Not a single meeting had been called in the last one and half years,” he said. The committee last met on January 4, 2013, when the government had to face a strong protest from the members against the implementation of two government orders extending regularization schemes for buildings constructed up to July 1, 2007. Both orders were struck down by the Madras high court in February 2014.
Citing major lapses in implementing building rules and Madras high court orders, the letter said the tragedy had brought into sharp focus the poor enforcement of rules and safety norms. “In view of the seriousness of the issues raised, we request you to convene a meeting within a week of the date of this letter,” it said.
Among the nine topics set for discussion at the emergency meeting are imposing heavy penalties on professional builders of illegal multi-storied and special buildings, identifying officers at CMDA and urban local bodies responsible for failure to enforce planning laws and recommending prosecution and disciplinary action against them. The letter sought implementation of the 2006 high court order on involving the monitoring committee in making changes to the master plan and development control rules that affect construction activity in the city.
Refusing to comment on the letter from the monitoring committee members, CMDA vice-chairman Pyare said a one-man commission was already appointed to probe the building collapse and the monitoring committee had nothing to do with the matter. He said the committee members would be informed about the details of next meeting.