The Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC), the planning authority for the city, is still in the dark regarding the deletion of public/ semi-public zone (PSPZ) of prime land adjacent to the National Chemical Laboratory (NCL) by the urban development (UD) department of the state government.
It is yet to receive an official communique from the UD department, even though the latter passed the order 19 days ago. The total area of the two tracts of land in question is about 2.2 acres, and is adjacent to the premier public laboratory on Pashan Road.
The land could not be developed commercially by its owner, Prakash N Baldota, as it was marked as PSPZ in the city development plan (DP), to be used for public institutes like NCL only.
The UD department passed an order on November 4 to delete the PSPZ of
the plot, valued at more than Rs25 crore, making it available for commercial
development following request letters from Baldota and the NCL director, S Sivaram.
Sivaram had apparently agreed to the land owner’s request to write a letter for the prime land, which the institute could have acquired for itself, thanks to the zoning.
The UD order states that the part plan of the DP showing the modifications is kept open for public during the office hours on working days in the PMC’s office for a month. DNA has been inquiring with the municipal commissioner’s office for more than a week to get access to the related documents for inspection.
But even till November 23 evening, the civic officials said the PMC has neither received any copy of the order nor any maps for inspection. The additional city engineer, Vivek Kharwadkar, said his office has not received any copy of the order.
