FCC

Chandigarh's Sector 20 to make way for group housing

2023-01-03

The government housing re-densification project, which aims to destroy outdated, primarily single-story homes and replace them with modern multi-story group housing, has focused on the sewermen colony in Sector 20. People now residing here would be relocated to other government facilities.

The colony, which spans between two and three acres, includes 116 dwellings, the smallest government accommodations in the city (smaller than category 13 government houses), with an average unit size of between 250 and 300 square feet.

In a committee formed to carry out the Chandigarh Master Plan (CMP-2031), UT adviser Dharam Pal had approved the project's re-densification earlier this year. The home allocation and UT engineering departments reported that the project had come to a halt after an examination of the existing government housing units revealed that the majority of them were in good condition. There were also issues with the re-allocation of people who were already living in homes that might be demolished. The planning department recently asked the engineering and housing allotment departments to find any homes where the re-densification project could start.

The colony was initially constructed as a transit accommodation. Additionally, several of these older structures have had their structural stability under scrutiny for a while.