While New Delhi Municipal Council (NDMC) has asked the shop owners to get safety certificates from structural engineers that the buildings they are doing their business is safe, the big question is who will certify the British era constructed buildings now.
The engineers and architects who build these building died long ago. Moreover, the top officials in NDMC are also unsure as to how they will justify the legitimacy of these certificates.
“We have received nine certificates yet. And our purpose to collect certificates is to check the potency of structure,” said a senior official NDMC.
When The Pioneer asked how the structural engineers would certify the foundations, the council has no answer since they themselves are not sure about the architectural map of the heritage buildings. “We are trying to approach private companies for three dimensional mapping. But as of now, we are collecting the certificates for shops only,” said the official.
Bizarre, without having the architectural map of entire building, the certification of single shop (restaurant or bar) is obscured, said another official.
Piyush Jain, a lawyer who had filed several petitions on illegal constructions in the CP area, said that collecting the safety certificates is completely an eye wash by the council. “The council should be answerable where they utilised the sanctioned money during the Commonwealth Games," said Jain.
Jain asked, “Are the (Structural Engineers) having the old building plans with themIJ” “On what basis they will issue safety certificates to the shop owners,” he added.
It may be noted that many shop owners have removed supporting pillars in shops to create more space and that led to mishaps. Two incidents of building collapse were reported in the current month. First incident was reported on February 2 from the C Block when a roof collapsed while the second incident took place on February 11 when the roof of building near Odeon Cinema came down.
Citing example of illegal construction in CP area, Jain added that F-7, N-45, N-6, E-44 and 41, F-56 ground floor, H-15, l-1 and 2, D-27, F-39, M-42, 1-C, 5 and 11 Sindhia House, 12 Central lane, 27 Abul Fazal Road, 24 School lane, 29 Babar Road are the places where heritage structure is being disturbed by the shop owners by their blatant alterations. “These engineers were also responsible for the unauthorised digging of basement at Aurangzeb lane,” he said.
It may be noted that the NDMC had also constituted a six-member panel, comprising of structural safety experts from IIT-Delhi, CPWD, DMC and the Sub-Divisional Magistrate of the area to inspect the site and ascertain the reason behind the collapse.
