Bhubaneswar: Hotel, kalyan mandap and even godown – these are some of the operations that came to fore when the state government began evicting encroachers from nearly 100 government quarters in Unit II area of the capital city on Tuesday. Allotments of these residential quarters were scrapped four years back for the implementation of the Capital Redevelopment Project, but encroachers had taken over the government properties.
A team comprising officials of the General Administration (GA) department, Bhubaneswar Development Authority, Roads and Buildings, Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation, Watco and TPCODL launched the crackdown on the day to evict illegal settlers from the quarters. The eviction was carried out in the presence of a section of police force from the Commissionerate of Police. An official from the GA department said following the crackdown, encroachers were removed from 13 quarters on the first day and their premises sealed. The eviction will continue till all the encroached quarters are freed.
As part of its Capital Redevelopment Project designed to address shortage of government quarters in the city, the state government had scrapped allotment of about 220 quarters, all under GA department, during 2019-20. However, due to delay in implementation of the project and lack of enforcement, around 100 quarters remained unauthorisedly occupied by the encroachers. A GA department official admitted that the encroachment was so huge that some illegal occupants had turned these quarters into commercial spaces, making it their godown, storage unit and manufacturing unit. Some individuals had also given a few of the quarters on rent to others. They found a hotel and a kalyan mandap running from these spaces.
