BHOPAL: The Cabinet, on Wednesday, approved a proposal for declaring illegal colonies legal. The Bill will become a law after the House passes it. Before the civic bodies’ polls, the government’s decision to legalise the colonies is considered a masterstroke. The Bill will open the road to 6,800 illegal colonies in the state becoming legal. In the Bill, there are provisions for punishing those who will set up illegal colonies in future. There are also provisions in the Bill for seven years’ jail term and a fine of Rs 10 lakh for building illegal colonies. Apart from that, the Bill contains provisions for auctioning the properties of colonisers to develop the colonies set up by them.
Those who give permission for setting up such colonies will also face the music. Before the 2018 Vishan Sabha elections, the BJP government had begun the process of legalising the colonies. At that time, the government had planned to combine Section 15 with the MP Nagar Palika Colony Registration and Restriction and Conditions Act, 1988, to legalise those colonies. The court has stopped it for following the wrong process to legalise those colonies.
Thus, the procedures completely stopped. Keeping in mind the court’s objection, the Nagar Palika (Amendment) Bill, 2021, is being brought. According to the new Bill, the colonies will be legalised by increasing the compounding fee by 20%. Earlier, the compounding fee was 10%.
