The audit of all sanctioned building plans that chief minister Suvendu Adhikari ordered on Wednesday evening is likely to begin by the end of this week, the Kolkata Municipal Corporation said on Thursday.
Borough-level teams have been set up at many places for the inspections.
Suvendu has ordered all construction stopped until July 31 while the audit is on.
“We are preparing lists of under-construction buildings in each borough. We are also preparing a set of things that need to be checked during the visits,” a civic official said.
The KMC has on the new BJP government’s watch displayed great swiftness in cracking down on any violation of building rules.
Two excavators were put to work on May 13 within two hours of Suvendu naming Topsia as a neighbourhood infested with illegal constructions. The civic body began pulling down a building that housed a leather goods unit where a fire the day before had killed three labourers.
On Thursday, a senior KMC official said each borough could have up to three inspection teams.
Civic sources said that while some boroughs — mostly in central and north Calcutta — had “very little scope for new construction”, some others “may have many under-construction buildings” and needed stricter watch.
“The teams will most likely start visiting the under-construction buildings by the end of this week,” KMC administrator Smita Pandey said.
“We are in the process of setting up borough-level teams. We have sought nominations from the Kolkata Metropolitan Development Authority, state civil defence department and others for their representatives in the borough teams.”
A team made up of officials from multiple departments — the PWD, police, KMC, KMDA, civil defence, and the fire and emergency services — as well as the CESC will visit building sites to conduct the audit.
Once the inspections are complete, the KMC will inform the builders whether they can go ahead with the construction.
“I have directly instructed that work on all under-construction buildings, whose plans were sanctioned by the government before us, particularly commercial buildings and those being built on filled-up water bodies, will remain suspended till July 31,” Suvendu had said on Wednesday.
Sources in the civic body said that though the administrator had ordered all construction stopped, the KMC would focus primarily on commercial buildings because of the scale.
“That does not mean that a two-storey (private) building coming up violating rules will be spared, but the focus will be on commercial buildings where many people will assemble for work or amusement,” an official said.
The real estate industry said that while the state government’s intent was laudable, the decision to freeze construction would have wider ramifications on projects.
Harshavardhan Neotia, chairman of the Ambuja Neotia group, said he hoped the suspension on construction would apply for only a short period.
“We are studying the government’s notification in detail to fully understand its scope and implications. In line with the directive, we have temporarily halted construction activities across all our ongoing projects,” he said.
“The construction sector involves a large ecosystem of stakeholders — including workers, contractors, suppliers and homebuyers — and hence (we) hope that the temporary pause in construction is for a short period.”
An executive from a real estate behemoth said builders were bound by rules framed by the Real Estate Regulatory Authority.
“We have to deliver the projects within a deadline. If we fail to do that, the flat owners are entitled to compensation,” said the official, whose company has at least five under-construction projects in New Town and Calcutta, covering over 3,00,000sqft.
“Because of the stop-work order until July 31, we are now asking workmen to go back to their native places. Mobilising the manpower and machines again will itself take a few days.”
