Date:01/09/2006 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2006/09/01/stories/2006090124830300.htm

New Delhi

Sealing, demolition drives continue

Staff Reporter

Around 150 properties in the Capital targeted

NEW DELHI: The Municipal Corporation of Delhi continued with its sealing and demolition drive on Thursday targeting around 150 properties across the Capital where illegal construction was going on even as the management and staff members of public school facing sealing in the wake of the Supreme Court order protested at Jantar Mantar demanding that they be regularised immediately to save the future of lakhs of students and teachers.

The MCD squads sealed around 50 properties in Rohini Zone covering various areas including Shalimar Bagh, Ashok Vihar, Onkar Nagar, Hansapuri, Tri Nagar, Rohini, Lawrance Road, Rishi Nagar, Prashant Vihar, Pitampura and Raja Park. Similarly, in West Zone, 40 shops were sealed at Subhash Nagar and New Khyala Road, while encroachments were removed from public land and roadside.

In Karol Bagh Zone, apart from demolishing two properties on Rama Road, sealing exercise was carried out at Rajinder Nagar, Gaushala Marg, Ratan Nagar, New Rohtak Road and Ramjas Road targeting at least 10 shops. In South Zone, eight properties were targeted at Kaushalya Park, Hauz Khas, Anupam Enclave, Munirka, Saket and East of Kailash.

In Central Zone, illegal portions of at least 30 properties were removed at South Extension-I, while 20 properties were sealed at Greater Kailash-II, Okhla, Lajpat Nagar, Tughlakhabad and Defence Colony. In Najafgarh Zone also some properties were targeted.

In Shahdara-North Zone, the MCD squads carried out major encroachment removal drive on the stretch between Old Seemapuri and New Seemapuri. More than 20 unauthorised roadside shops and boundary walls were removed, while at Dilshad Garden market, more than 30 illegal shops were removed from roadside.

Meanwhile, management and staff members of several public schools staged a protest against the decision to seal around 1,700 recognised schools that have come up in residential properties in violation of the Master Plan. Gathered under the banner of the Delhi State Public Schools Management Association, the protesters also submitted a memorandum to the Congress president Sonia Gandhi seeking her intervention in the issue.

"We have urged Ms. Gandhi to ask the Congress-led UPA Government to amend the Master Plan for Delhi-2001, so that more than 1,700 schools could be regularised,or else over eight-lakh students will be thrown out of these schools after September 15." said the association president R.C. Jain.