Tata housing project, HC stay affords scope to introspect

The stay on bookings, sales and construction activities on the 19-tower Tata Camelot housing colony project in Punjab’s Kansal village in the vicinity of Chandigarh ordered by the Punjab and Haryana High Court on Thursday affords an opportunity for a hard look at the controversial project which, in its present form, poses a grave threat to the skyline of the country’s only planned city as The Tribune has been pointing out through a sustained public-spirited campaign. It is heartening too that the Union Territory administration has been given time until March 31 to finalize its master plan. It would indeed be prudent for the governments of Punjab, Haryana and Chandigarh to use this opportunity to work jointly towards integration of their respective master plans in right earnest so that the beauty, the majesty and the ecological balance of Chandigarh are duly maintained, as averred by the court.

Significantly, since the Camelot site falls within the catchment area of the Sukhna lake, an ecologically sensitive zone because of its proximity to Sukhna Wildlife Sanctuary, the Union Environment Ministry is looking into whether environmental clearance to it would be in order. Though the Chandigarh Administration has been opposing construction activity in the city’s periphery around Sukhna’s catchment area, categorizing it as an ecologically sensitive zone, it is yet to issue a notification declaring the area around the Sukhna Wildlife Sanctuary as an eco sensitive zone. It would indeed be in the fitness of things if this is done without further delay. The latest guidelines issued by the Union Environment Ministry for declaration of eco-sensitive zones around national parks and wildlife sanctuaries clearly say that discharge of effluents and solid waste in natural water bodies or terrestrial area in the eco-sensitive areas will not be allowed.
It is noteworthy that some leading architects and town planners had, at a seminar last month in Chandigarh, pointed out how the multi-tower, high-rise Tata project would defy town planning norms and would be violative of the New Punjab Periphery Control Act and the Edict of Chandigarh that banned construction in the north of the Capitol Complex. This and related issues need to be examined threadbare now that the High Court has stayed any further movement in the Tata Camelot project. 

Source: The Tribune, Chandigarh, India

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