The 49th CMDA monitoring committee meeting was, for the first time, held without the participation of the High Court-appointed non-official members.
A CMDA official denied that the non-official members boycotted the meeting and said they did not participate in the meeting.
The monitoring committee has 12 members - six official and six non-official. The non-official members appointed by the High Court were opposing the Regularisation Scheme 2012, which, they claimed, went against the principles and cut off date set by the 2006 High Court order.
The members felt that extending the cut off date from July 27, 1999 to July 1, 2007 was not sanctioned by the court. The government recently published the guidelines and rules to implement it. The members felt that this move clearly showed that the State and the CMDA had decided to go ahead with the regularisation.
Surprisingly, not one application has been received in Chennai Metropolitan Area. The monitoring committee members said,“There is uncertainty over the regularisation scheme, so why would anyone go and pay the money,” they said.
But town planning and CMDA sources blamed it on the lacunae in the rule. “The current regularisation scheme did not take lessons from the earlier 1999 regularisation scheme, which itself was a failure,” they said.
“They are asking for the certified copy of Property Tax Assessment Working Sheet, which is available only to those buildings in Corporation limits. The buildings in panchayats never have these working sheets, neither do the institutions which are run by Trusts. The stringent rules put forth under the regularisation scheme are also making the violators hesitant to approach for regularisation of their building. It should have been done irrespective of any violation,” the sources said.
While the government has legalised the buildings till 2007, what would be the fate of illegal buildings built between 2007-12, he added.