Chandigarh: In an order with major implications for the real estate sector in Haryana, Punjab and Haryana high court on Thursday restrained state govt from proceeding with its “stilt-plus-4 policy,” which allows four-storey houses in residential sectors and colonies.The interim order will remain in effect until HC delivers a final decision on a batch of petitions challenging the policy.“Since the arguments are taking a long time to conclude for reasons attributed to the counsel for rival parties, it is deemed appropriate by this court, at this stage, without commenting on the validity of the impugned order/notification dated July 2, 2024, passed by the additional chief secretary, government of Haryana, town and country planning department, to restrain the state from going ahead with the ‘stilt + 4 floor policy’ for residential plots and to stay the effect and operation of the impugned order/notification till the next date of hearing,” a division bench comprising Chief Justice Sheel Nagu and Justice Sanjiv Berry said on Thursday.The bench is hearing a bunch of petitions filed by General V P Malik, former Army chief, challenging construction of such buildings in Panchkula, and Sunil Singh and others regarding the same in Gurgaon.In the detailed order, the Chief Justice referred to a report received from a high court-appointed committee, which inspected and measured the width of internal roads in Gurgaon’s residential sectors and other licensed colonies to know the impact of permitting stilt plus four buildings.“The inspection report essentially revealed that the prescribed width of internal roads of Sector 28, DLF Phase-I, Gurugram, is either 10m or 12m (boundary wall to boundary wall). As against the aforesaid prescribed width, the motorable road area available for plying of traffic and pedestrians is only 3.9m-4.8m. This shrinkage is attributed to various reasons, which essentially are lack of adequate infrastructure of sanitation and sewerage, over-population, defective town planning, inadequate garbage disposal, blocking of aquifers by indiscriminate paving of roads, rampant construction activities thereby preventing recharging of groundwater etc,” HC has observed in its 12-page order.The bench further observed that a bare perusal of the expert committee’s report reveals that the concern was that in the absence of infrastructural back-up, any permission to increase the number of floors would lead to additional burden on the existing infrastructure.HC also observed that Gurgaon is on the verge of crumbling with increased use by a larger population (residing on the 4th floor) without adequate infrastructural capacity.The CaseFormer Army chief, General VP Malik, and some other environmentalists knocked on the doors of HC in 2024 through a PIL against ‘apartmentalisation’ of Haryana Sahari Vikas Pradhikaran (HSVP) developed residential sectors in Haryana because of permissions to build stilt-plus four-storey buildings and increase in Floor Area Ratio (FAR). They sought directions to quash the increase in maximum purchasable FAR and maximum permissible heights (stilt-plus four) introduced vide Haryana building code 2016 and 2017. According to them, such moves to increase FAR and permission to build stilt-plus-4 are without any scientific / engineering study about the impact of introduction of such changes and without making any provisions of claiming compensation for the damage resulting from implementation of such policy decisions.
