Realty nightmare: Nine years on, possession a far cry for JIT plot owners

Avneet Kaur

Jalandhar, July 14

Residents of the Surya Enclave Extension here are up in arms against the Jalandhar Improvement Trust (JIT). They said despite having spent lakhs of rupees on buying a plot in the Surya Enclave Extension, a scheme launched by the JIT in 2011, the plot owners are yet to get the possession of their land till date.

Besides, they complained that their entire area has been converted into a dumping ground and that the Municipal Corporation workers, after collecting garbage from all over the city, dump it here in their empty plots.

Talking to the Tribune, ML Sehgal, president of the Surya Enclave Extension Welfare Society, said the JIT had miserably failed to remove unauthorised encroachments from their area which is the main hurdle behind allottees not receiving possession of their plots yet. “There are a number of encroachments in the ‘C and D’ block of the complex and in the society park. Also, there is a slaughterhouse in the complex, which despite repeated complaints, has not been removed,” he said.

Besides, overhead high tension wires of the PSPCL over the allotted plots, have also not been removed. “There is no proper water or sewerage system and even roads are also not constructed in the area,” Sehgal said.

He further said migrant workers from South India and Uttar Pradesh have illegally occupied residential plots that belong to various allottees. “There are a total of 16 allottees, who had paid around Rs 40 lakh to Rs 50 lakh each, but till date they have not got the possession as these encroachers refuse to clear the area and even the JIT had failed to take any action against them,” Sehgal said.

“Apart from this, the JIT is yet to clear encroachments on the Maharaja Agarsain road (120 feet road lying unconstructed) which gives a very shoddy look to the colony. There is a factory falling in between and some migrants have built their kuccha houses on the road, which needs to relocated,” said Naresh Gupta, General Secretary, Federation of Residents and welfare Societies, adding that the residents since long have been demanding the construction of a 120-ft road connecting to the Damoria Railway Overbridge with National Highway via Surya Enclave Extension, but the authorities concerned paying no heed.

According to a residents of Surya Enclave Extension, they have on several occasion paid visits and handed over memorandums to the officials of MC, JIT, MLAs, MP regarding the garbage and debris being thrown into the area, problem of encroachments and the non-development of the scheme, however, nothing concrete has been done officially to deliver the results.

Meanwhile, JIT, Chairman, Daljit Ahluwalia, said, “Encroachers were demanding to be accommodated to some other area, so we were in contact with the higher authorities, but now we have received permission to allot them two marlas residential land outside the Surya Enclave Extension. So, from next week onwards, we would start clearing the encroachments,” he said.