CUTTACK: The Orissa High Court allowed Cuttack Municipal Corporation’s plea seeking two-month time to be ready with new set of guidelines which the civic body feels are required for operating kalyan mandaps (banquet halls) in the Millennium City.
The court was hearing on Tuesday a PIL filed by E Venkat Rao in 2015 on traffic chaos and seeking intervention against increased congestion during social functions around these mandaps, as most of them did not have enough parking space.
CMC counsel Debashis Nayak stated that the process of preparing the detailed regulation is taking time and the corporation expects that the exercise will be completed within two months from today (June 21).
The civic body had engaged the services of a consultant CRISIL for preparation of CDA (Planning & Building Standards for Core areas) Regulations for regulating development of core areas of Cuttack. The regulations would also deal with the issue of construction of kalyan mandaps in the core area, the court was informed.
Allowing the plea, the division bench of Chief Justice S Muralidhar and Justice RK Pattanaik said, “The court directs that the regulations shall be prepared and placed before the government for its approval not later than 5th September, 2022.” While fixing September 12 as the next date for hearing on the matter the bench said, “In the meanwhile, the directions issued by this court on November 9, 2016 as reiterated in the order dated February 8, 2022 will continue.”
On November 9, 2016, the court had prescribed guidelines for operating of kalyan mandaps in the city.
In its guidelines, the court made it mandatory for the mandaps to earmark 40 per cent of built-up area for parking. However, earmarking 20 per cent of built-up area for parking was permitted in the case of banquet halls that had functioned for at least five years on the condition that there would be no parking on public roads.
The guidelines also made it mandatory for kalyan mandap owners to install CCTV cameras, fire extinguishers and ensure that there was no noise pollution beyond the prescribed time as per the rule and payment of users’ fee in advance for solid waste management.