Haryana government amends law to tackle mushrooming of illegal colonies

GURUGRAM: To curb the mushrooming of illegal colonies, the state government has now made it mandatory to obtain a ‘no-objection certificate’ (NOC) from the department of town and country planning for registration of land parcels measuring less than one acre (4,840 sq yard). Earlier, the cap was two kanals (1,200 sq yard).

This was done through an amendment to Section 7A of the Haryana Development and Regulation of Urban Areas (amendment) Act, 2017. Also the state government has changed the word ‘agricultural land’ to ‘vacant land’ to prevent the use of farm land from being utilised as a loophole for setting up illegal colonies.

“In Section 7A of the principal Act, for the words “lease any agricultural land” and “two kanals”, the words “lease or gift any vacant land” and “one acre” shall respectively be substituted; and ‘vacant land’ shall mean such land wherein either no construction of any nature exists or such construction is in existence which is either uninhabited or not fit for human habitation and stands constructed without following the due course of law,” read the government notification.

The move follows multiple complaints of illegal registries of land in the past three months. During the lockdown period, around 10,000 land registrations had been done in Gurgaon. Of these, at least 1,200 land parcels had been registered in an illegal manner after property dealers allegedly connived with local tehsildars.

“The amendment is expected to prevent illegal colonies from coming up as well as fraudulent sale and purchase of land to a large extent,” director of DTCP KM Pandurang said.

District town planner RS Batth said that many developers used to construct temporary or permanent structures on agricultural land claiming it was a vacant land. “The amendment has now included all vacant land, falling under 95 villages of Gurgaon, under the notification,” he said.