Bill for redevelopment of Gujarat Housing Board colonies in budget session

The Gujarat government is all set to table an important bill for the redevelopment of housing colonies built by Gujarat Housing Board (GHB). The government will make an amendment into the Gujarat Housing Board Act, 1961 that will allow 25 years old or more GHB built housing colonies to undergo redevelopment with the consent of 75 per cent members.
Accordingly, the government had issued an ordinance in November last year and that will be implemented through the act by making an amendment.
Sources in the government informed, “After several incidents of collapse of old buildings in cities, the government had altered the act for private housing colonies and now the colonies built by GHB also would undergo redevelopment under the act. The ordinance issued by the government needs to make a provision in the act for its perpetual implementation.”
“The Urban Development Department(UDD) has drafted a bill providing the condition of consent of 75 per cent members required for redevelopment in place of 100 per cent members. This is already under implementation through the amendment made in Gujarat Ownership Flat Act for private housing colonies,” added the sources.
The Urban Development Department will invite private developers for the redevelopment of GHB colonies, in which, the original members will be given the flats. Moreover, the new building shall have ten floors in place of three floors at present. The developer will get 3-floor space index(FSI) for this public-private partnership initiative.
There are around 500 housing colonies that are 25 years old or more and more than 15,000 houses can undergo redevelopment.
Besides this, the UDD may come up with one more amendment in Gujarat Provincial Municipal Corporation Act, 1949. The amendment will be on delegation of power for recruitment of officials of deputy municipal commissioner(DyMC) and assistant municipal commissioner(AMC) to government and civic bodies both.
Sources from the department said, “The powers of recruitment of these class I and II level officials are with the state government but now the powers will be shared with the local civic bodies too. This will lessen the burden on government and will give freedom to civic bodies to recruit officials as per their choice and requirements. The draft of the bill is yet to be prepared. If everything goes smooth, the bill will be tabled in assembly for the approval of the house.”
Both these bills will be tabled in the Gujarat assembly during its budget session during February 18 to 22.