KARACHI, Dec 21: The Karachi Building Control Authority (KBCA) has, so far, received 7,500 applications for regularization of illegal buildings and the number of such applications may go up by 10,000 by Dec 31.

Stating this on Tuesday, the chief controller of buildings, Brig (Retd) A S Nasir, said the KBCA had issued 10,000 notices to owners of buildings for illegal constructions and, on average, about 400 applications for regularization of such buildings were being received every month. Senior officials of the KBCA, including Manzoor Qadir, Mohammad Shafiq, Ali Zafar Quadri, were also present.

Describing the response of owners of such buildings as 'encouraging', he hoped that the plan would generate about Rs 1 billion under the head of scrutiny fee and other fines to be imposed on violations.

The KBCA has already received Rs 36.674 million under the head of scrutiny fee and has issued challans amounting to Rs 52.014m to those desiring to get their buildings regularized, he added.

Agreeing with a questioner that the number of illegal buildings in the city was quite high, he said as a matter of fact around 50 per cent of the total buildings have been constructed illegally, besides all buildings constructed in the city kachchi abadis have been built illegally.

Reiterating that an opportunity has been provided to those having small housing units, in particular, and others, in general, Brig Nasir said the deadline fixed for submitting applications for regularization of illegal buildings at much lower rates will expire on Dec 31.

He said although the regularization process was quite lengthy, a speedy disposal cell has been set up to expeditiously clear all the cases of regularization. About highrises, he said it has been made mandatory for every ground-plus-four building to provide two lifts, car parking, electricity generator, besides having fire-fighting facilities and providing greenery in such projects.

He made it clear that no NOC will be required for constructing buildings in commercial areas if necessary infrastructure, such as water supply, sewerage system, roads, electricity and telephones are available in such areas.

Replying to a question, he said most of illegal constructions take place in kachchi abadis merely because no law is implemented in such abadis. Referring to the KBCA's task of demolishing illegal buildings, he said that despite shortage of technical staff, the KBCA has provided specific training to 35 officials for undertaking demolition works and these officials would be absorbed in the recently created demolition squads.