East Delhi residents can now construct on terrace without involving other owners in building

NEW DELHI: The East Delhi Municipal Corporation (EDMC) has introduced a policy that will
allow owners of top floors of residential buildings to obtain sanction for construction on terraces
without having to involve owners of other floors, Mayor Shyam Sunder Aggarwal said on
Wednesday.
This is part of the EDMC’s policy on floor-wise sanction and regularisation of the existing floors
in residential buildings, in both regular and unauthorised regularised colonies, for the benefit of
the general public, he said.
Aggarwal said the step was taken as the EDMC received a number of complaints regarding
blackmailing of owners of top floors of buildings by owners of lower floors or “demands for
money” being made by the latter.
He said in regular and unauthorised regularised colonies, the right of ownership of the terrace
remains with the resident of the top floor of a building.
Earlier, if the top floor owner wanted to construct a fresh floor, then he or she had to produce a
no-objection certificate (NOC) from the owners of the lower floors to get the building plan
sanctioned by the municipality. This led to malpractices, he added.
“We had received several complaints in this regard. Now as per the new policy, the owner of the
top floor of a residential building can obtain the sanction for the building plan for construction on
terrace within the permissible height of 15 metres. There will be no need for signature or NOC
from owners of lower floors,” Aggrawal said at a press conference.
However, the services of lower floor owners shall not be disturbed, he added.
According to the new policy, the mayor said, an applicant shall have to obtain a structural safety
certificate for the existing building to ensure that it can take the additional load.
They can get it from the prescribed expert agencies like IIT Delhi and Roorkee, Jamia Millia
Islamia and RITES, among others.
Aggrawal, however, said that the new policy will not be applicable to DDA societies. It will be
implemented in regular colonies such as Preet Vihar and Vivek Vihar etc., and unauthorised
regularised colonies like Geeta Colony and Krishna Nagar.
Leader of House Satyapal Singh, who also addressed the media, said the EDMC will grant
sanction considering the rights of construction in the ownership documents of the applicant and
provisions of the Building Bye Laws and the Master Plan of Delhi.
This facility will also be available for regularisation of the existing floors, he said.