Civic body criticised for razing buildings sans plan

Chittoor: To earn an additional revenue, officials of the Chittoor Municipal Corporation had demolished the existing old bus stand and 25 other commercial shops, located in the heart of the city, five years ago, and proposed to construct a new commercial complex at a cost of Rs 5 crore in its place.

The new complex was planned with 200 commercial shops with parking space. But, the civic officials have failed to construct the new building as they were unable to arrange funds. Earlier, the Corporation used to earn Rs 10 lakh as rent every month from commercial shops.

It is learnt that civic body had lost the revenue of Rs 3 crore in the five years as they failed to construct the commercial complex in time. In fact, Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu was supposed to lay foundation stone for the proposed commercial complex six months ago.

Due to funds paucity, the civic officials have postponed the construction of the building. Likewise, the Corporation officials had demolished the building which was housing the Indian Red Cross Society branch here three years ago with a plan to construct a statue island.

Now, the land is lying idle. Recently, the civic body tried to demolish the monumental building of I-Town police station. But, the demolition was postponed as the Chief Minister reportedly against the move. There are allegations that the ruling party was resorting to extraordinary measures without ground work as the opposition is not active in the city.

Speaking to The Hans India here on Wednesday, Chittoor Municipal Corporation Commissioner M Balasubramanyam has admitted the funds crunch due to which delay in the construction of commercial building. “We are trying to secure loan from financial instructions,” he added.

By C Prabhakara Rao