AAP government says it needs 2 more years to regularise unauthorised colonies

Union Minister Hardeep Singh Puri Tuesday said the AAP government has sought two more years to deal with unauthorised colonies in Delhi. Regularisation of unauthorised colonies was one of the biggest poll promises made by the Aam Aadmi Party ahead of the 2015 Delhi assembly elections.

The migrant population forms a crucial vote bank for the ruling AAP in the national capital. Interacting with reporters after the launch of the DDA's web portal for land pooling policy here, Puri said since 2006, thanks to the Delhi government's policies, the Centre has not been able to regularise any of unauthorised colonies.

The Union housing and urban affairs minister said the Arvind Kejriwal-led Delhi government recently sought another two years to complete the work required for the regularisation of these colonies. Puri, flanked by Lt Governor Anij Baijal, said his ministry had set up a committee under the chairmanship of secretary to look into the issue of unauthorised colonies and this panel was told by the Delhi government in May or June 2017 that it had needed two years.

"Now recently again, when we persuaded them, we were told that they (Delhi government) want another two years… on the one hand, we talk about solving the housing problems and on the other hand the local government in Delhi is somehow not on board," the minister told reporters. Talking about the DDA's land pooling policy, he said it would allow the city to get 17 lakh housing units capable of accommodating 76 lakh people. Using the web portal, all processes of receiving applications, verifications, grant of approvals and licences, etcetera, are expected to be completed in a time-bound manner through a single-window system, according to the DDA.

(With inputs from agencies.)