Meghalaya High Court should take prompt action to streamline hazardous building
Thomas Lim
In a major development, Meghalaya High Court has put a stop to unplanned and mushrooming of high rise building in the state. The ruling simply brushed off the recent Cabinet decision to revise the height of construction and replaced the original Building Bye Law of only permitting four storey, including ground floor. The Order was in response to the Public-Interest Litigation (PIL) filed by a city based Advocate.
It is also time for more PILs to prevent rampant growth within the vicinity of Shillong. Further construction should be allowed only outside the already chocked capital of the state. In the same Ruling, the High Court is only contemplating to demolish the building which has violated the Law, in reality it is time to execute such action, as Meghalaya falls under Seismic Zone V. Such buildings surely are posing threat to the habitat in the time of disaster.
The previous limit for height of a domestic building was 45 feet and for the commercial was 65 feet. But it was revised to 65 feet for domestic buildings and 95 feet for commercial buildings.