In a high level meeting on 15th November 2003, the Governor of Sindh directed the provincial bureaucracy and city officials to review the setting up of special courts to check building violations. Rising encroachments along the main roads and streets, illegal construction along right of way and conversion of landuse in residential localities were among the main reasons for this directive.
The Governor directed the Karachi Building Control Authority (KBCA) to take effective measures to check all kinds of buildings violations. Whereas the intention of the Governor is well meaning, the issues related to this planning and management aspect of the city are complex and convoluted. They need to be observed on the basis of existing developmental realities confronting the city and the interests and actions of the stakeholders involved in these affairs.
The encroachments along the main roads normally fall under the jurisdiction of urban land management agency. In the case of major city arteries, the City District Government Karachi (CDGK) is the concerned body, not KBCA. Apparently the CDGK does not possess the capacity to entirely clear the city roads and prevent them from re-encroachments. Several anti-encroachment drives have been undertaken in the past in different locations without yielding any sustainable results. This continuing failure has several reasons. There are growing needs for impulse shopping and vending activity along major transit points due to rising number of commuters. As such, no planned provision is kept to legally accommodate them. Even busy urban locations of Saddar, Old Town, North Nazimabad, Landhi, Tariq Road and several other locations do not carry any planned provision to house this desired activity. Since the vendors and hawkers sell cheap merchandise which has a sizable clientele, they find ways and means to operate after developing working relationship with state officials.
It is also misconstrued that encroachments are a disorganized, individualistic and temporary activity. On the contrary, research studies have revealed that vendors are a fairly organized lot of traders. They have formed welfare associations as bodies to safeguard their existence and collective interests. Whenever they are removed from their existing places of residence, they return after striking clandestine deals with the state officials who are also a party in the economic gains accrued from this activity. According to the findings of the Urban Resource Centre, the monthly amount paid by hawkers/vendors in Saddar alone to the municipal and law enforcement officials is more than Rs. 5.00 million.
Law enforcing agencies and many government departments have constructed unauthorized structures on the main roads in Karachi. Studies have revealed that over 40 police posts are constructed on the pubic open spaces without any lawful authority. Around 13 police stations in the city have blatantly violated property line considerations during their construction and expansion. Other government departments have also followed suit wherever they found an opportunity. Upon reference, these agencies simply refuse to take a corrective action towards their wrongful acts. Needless to say that when law enforcers become violators to the worst end, no improvement can be thought about.
Conversion of landuse, particularly from low density to high density and residential to commercial/other productive uses is on a meteoric rise. There are many underlying reasons to this factor. The nexus of builder-developer and building control officials obtain dubious permissions and ‘no objection certificates’ (NOCs) from the concerned departments for conversions leading to lucrative commercial gains. Multiplication of additional stories, secretly declaring streets as fit for commercialization, encroaching on more public land for developing building projects and even trying out development along main arteries are a few examples. At one instance the defunct Master Plan Department even studied the possibility of declaring a few blocks of PECHS (now in Jamshed Town jurisdiction) as commercial. If implemented, it would have caused a havoc in the daily life of the residents. Since the zoning considerations are outdated and no master plan exists in the city, such activities flourish without the slightest of restraint.
The so-called land grabbing mafia also become a partner in crime. Financing of building projects is a grey area of operations. It is commonly alleged that the undocumented capital finds its way into construction enterprise which has a safe and least risk outlay. The mechanism of enforcement of building and town planning regulations is too fragile against the enormity of stakes involved. Several building sites on Shahrah-e-Faisal, Clifton (Scheme-5), societies areas and M.A. Jinnah Road are a citation to this irregularity. Some buildings are completed and occupied while others are passing through different phases of construction, reaping profits for their unscrupulous entrepreneurs.
Building and town planning regulations are a basic reference to monitor the construction activity in the city. These regulations were initially framed under the provision of Sindh Building Control Ordinance, 1979. They remained enforced for more than two decades. In their focus and spirit, the regulations were prescriptive in nature. The government decided to revise these regulations during 1997-98 onwards. After a lengthy process of review and consultation, several committees appointed for the purpose gave their recommendations to the KBCA and Housing and Town Planning Department of the Sindh Government. The revised regulations were notified in 2002. However the spirit and format of the new regulations did not change. It is however vital to note that these bylaws became inadequate due to rapid institutional changes that followed as a consequence of enforcement of the Sindh Local Government Ordinance 2001 (and the devolution plan) as a whole.
The merging of Karachi Development Authority and its Master Plan and Environmental Control Department was an important event. In the new situation, the devolved KDA is a part and parcel of CDGK while KBCA is a body working under the provincial government. In the present politics of confrontation, it is not likely to have congenial working relationship between CDGK and KBCA/provincial government. Thus the issue of enforcement of building regulations are likely to suffer. It may also be noted that the building regulations cover a fraction of the total urban area of Karachi with many overlappings and confusions affecting their utility. The incomprehensible combination of walk-up type structures facing monstrous high rises on the same street in Gulistan-e-Jauhar, M. A. Jinnah Road and Saddar represent the institutional disharmony of the worst kinds. Unless these institutional relations are streamlined, little improvement can be achieved. Courts and strict penalizing measures may not generate the desired results due to several ambiguities remaining in the system.
Many larger issues directly affect the overall building construction activity and violations related to it. The city does not possess a valid master plan to give appropriate legality to the rapidly transforming city functions. A large number of agencies, mainly cantonments, do not follow the city government’s writ on the issues of development, thus creating multiple standards as an outcome. For instance, city government tends to restrict high rise development in the main areas under its control. On the contrary, the Cantonment Boards do not exercise any restriction in controlling them. The landuse data required as a base line for enforcing any kind of regulations does not exist. Diversity acquired in the building types and utility pattern is also not accounted for in the new regulations. It shall be entirely unjust to examine new building types such as centralized shopping malls for which no prior information exists in the annals of enforcing authorities.
In the light of the prevailing scenario of development and management, several steps need a serious consideration. The present institutional arrangement clearly suggest that KBCA must be devolved and made part of the CDGK. The Master Plan Group of Offices need to be revamped to undertake its essential task of planning in a technically proficient and socially appropriate manner. This wing of the CDGK should absorb building control function as was the logic and practice in the past. It shall however be vital to note that necessary legislative changes will be needed to make this change administratively viable. The CDGK must take up developmental planning on priority.
This shall help synchronize the emerging realities of Karachi with the ongoing attempts towards enforcement of regulations. Building regulations need to be further revised to accommodate the changes and diversities in developmental trends. Instead of resorting to make prescriptive bylaws, a pilot project may be launched to enact performance based bylaws. For this purpose the principle of incentive zoning should be applied. Encroachments of government departments, including police, must be done away with as the starting point of the exercise. Unless the government departments do not practice what they preach, little betterment can be expected in the prevailing scenario.
