KARACHI, March 5: The ongoing campaign by the Karachi Building Control Authority (KBCA) for regularization of residential plots or conversion of plot category has raised concern among the private school owners.

After the first round of notices initiated in December, the KBCA has started issuing warning notices to private schools, calling for regularization of educational buildings established on residential plots.

A senior official of the KBCA said that owners of schools, marriage halls, restaurants and hospitals had been asked to proceed for regularization of their structures allegedly erected in violation of rules, otherwise the buildings would either be sealed or demolished.

To a question, he said in the first phase the marriage halls were being issued letters, while schools would be called for remedial measures in the second phase, but not later than March 18, a date which has been fixed by the government to give a one- time amnesty to those who misused residential plots.

However, a controller of buildings in a town said that his staff had issued about 250 notices, including those to schools, on Tuesday and Wednesday and if the concerned quarters failed to respond within the three-day period, severe action would be taken against them for violating building rules.

The conversion rate has been fixed at Rs4,000 per square-yard, while another Rs4,000 per square-yard would be charged as a penalty for failing to comply with the completion or regularization rules for long, the official added.

It was learnt that the KBCA had asked school owners to submit the regularization plans for consideration latest by March 18. It said that schools were being run on residential plots in different parts of the city, which was similar to commercial ventures.

As such, it was further claimed, most of the schools were violating the Sindh Regularization and Control (use of plots and construction of buildings) Ordinance 2002.

The owners of residential plots, where schools are in operation, have also been asked to get their premises regularized after paying a prescribed fee to the KBCA.

The All-Private Schools Management Association said that such notices and warnings to seal buildings on a three-day notice were causing concern among school owners. Most of the schools are being run as non-profit organizations and welfare bodies and it would be undesirable to ask for payment of such a huge fee, ranging up to Rs0.5million in some cases, said an office-bearer of the association.

The association said that if the KBCA was not stopped from taking unjust action against private schools, it would be difficult for them to function.

In separate letters to the governor of Sindh, City Nazim and the executive education officer of the city government, the association maintained that the KBCA notices and imposition of taxes and penalties would increase the cost of education, which was against the federal government’s incentive package for private schools.

The high-ups have been urged to look into the private schools’ problems on a priority basis and instruct the KBCA not to issue notices to private schools, as they were non-commercial institutions.