Online rule blocks house plans; 60 to 90 days to get approval

Kakinada: Citizens are finding it difficult to get the approval for their house plans from the municipalities including Rajahmundry and Kakinada Municipal Corporations.

The state government has made it mandatory to apply for approval online from April 1. It was announced that it would eliminate corruption under the process which is relatively easy. But in fact, people are finding it extremely difficult to get approvals and it is taking at least 60 to 90 days. They should not start their constructions, unless they get approvals.

“Our all plans and budget for construction are ruined and the cost of budget may be also increased due to delaying of approvals,” said T. Venkatarao, an architect engineer.

According to sources, the licensed surveyor or the architecture engineer designed the plan in separate software and it should be submitted to the Town Planning Department and then after verification of the plan, he receives a message from the officials for the plan. Later, he would pay the fees through his bank account. Later, the supervisors visit the site and make their report online for the progress of the site.

According to sources, nearly 200 plans are pending with the different municipalities for months together without giving approvals. The Kakinada Municipality has to clear nearly 50 approvals and Rajahmundry is 70 approvals, according to sources. 

A builder D. Subrahmanyam said that all site documents should be sent to the departments online. But some of the site owners cannot do this due to illiteracy and lack of awareness of the procedure.

Some of the persons are collecting huge money from the site owners and exploiting them,” he said and requested the government to liberalise the procedure for convenience of the middle class and below poverty line people.

Otherwise, they have to make go endlessly to the officials to get approval. The officials said that there was no delay on their part, if they submit all
documents online.