Hit hard by HC order, hoteliers now pin hope on new govt

Lalit Mohan

Tribune News Service

Dharamsala, January 16

Hoteliers of Dharamsala, who have lost their power and water connections following the High Court order, are now lobbying with the new BJP government to bail them out. A delegation of the hoteliers association met Minister for Town and Country Planning Sarween Chaudhary and Chief Minister Jai Ram Thakur and submitted a memorandum of their demands.

As per the memorandum, the hoteliers have demanded that compounding of deviations in buildings under the municipal corporation should be increased from the present 10 to 40 per cent. At present, the commissioner of the Municipal Corporation Dharamsala has the power to compound deviations up to 10 per cent in the original maps passed by the authorities.

However, hoping that their deviations in buildings would be regularised under the policy adopted by the previous Congress government under which it had proposed to regularise deviations up to 100 per cent, a large numbers of hoteliers in Dharamsala had raised illegal constructions. The policy brought by the previous government has now been struck down by the high court. The hoteliers, who had raised illegal constructions, now have been left in the lurch. The hoteliers are now demanding that deviations up to 40 per cent should be regularised on the plea that if it was done, more than 90 per cent hotels would be saved from penal action.

The hoteliers are now demanding that floor area ratio (FAR) for the hotel industry should be increased from 150 per cent to 200 per cent and height of buildings should be allowed up to 25 metre against the present limit of 21 metre.

At present, FAR for the hotel industry was 1.5 and height of hotel buildings was restricted to 21 metre. This puts small plot owners at a disadvantage and they cannot realise full potential of their land, especially in commercial places, where cost of land was over Rs 1 crore per kanal.

The hoteliers also demanded that the development plan of Dharamsala should be redrawn and all buildings should be developed with retrospective affect. The demand was being made to rescue those who have raised buildings in core area of McLeodganj. The core area of Dharamsala has long been changed and it now has illegal hotels, shops and commercial buildings. Legal experts are of the view that buildings cannot be regularised by the government with retrospective affect.

The hoteliers are also demanding that they should be taken into confidence while drawing development plans under the Smart City scheme. They have also demanded that more parking places should be created in tourist places.

Interestingly, as per the Town and Country Planning rules every hotel has to have parking at the ground level. However, very few hotels in upper Dharamsala have parking places. The parking places have been converted into shops or commercial portions by the hoteliers.