DDA’s Green Development Area policy will provide an integrated framework for ‘green-oriented’ development in the city, help curb pollution and enable investors to monetise land investment, the National Real estate Development Council has said.
The draft policy aims to regulate development in designated rural areas and green belts in the city and seeks to incorporate the low density residential areas (LDRA) of the capital where most of the farmhouses are located encompassing an area of 54,000 acres.
Several planners, real estate experts, lawyers and members of farmhouse Residents Welfare Associations deliberated at the Consultative Process on DDA Green Development Policy organized by Naredco on April 6. They discussed the challenges and gaps in the existing policy.
While addressing the NAREDCO workshop, Manju Paul, Additional Commissioner, Planning, Delhi Development Authority (DDA), said, “The Green Development Area Policy is extremely important and DDA is very keen to implement it without any delay.”
She said that the recommendations, as received would be put up to the board of inquiry and suggestions incorporated in the policy. She also indicated that the DDA would also invite NAREDCO for presenting their recommendations to the board of inquiry. The regulations will lay down a detailed procedure to ensure implementation of the policy.
“Whatever structure we develop, we will have local bodies on board who will be handholding us and a single window mechanism will take care of all approvals that would be required. The Green Development Area Policy takes into cognizance the LDRA and the green belt and their consolidated development. Its aimed at ensuring that there is seamless connectivity between LDR and the green belt. The Master Plan 2041 also takes into account housing for the urban poor in consonance with the government’s rental housing policy,” she said.
She added that in every policy, the escrow account mechanism would be mandated.
In the course of deliberations, planners and farmhouse associations had suggested that an escrow account be put in place to ensure that collections from an area are ploughed back for development of that particular area and do not find their way to the city Central’s corpus and that there ought to be one implementing agency.
Rajeev Talwar, chairman, NAREDCO, said that a large number of people have invested in land and hoped that through the policy they would be able to monetise their investments.
“With the help of DDA, we have already submitted the first draft of MPD 2041. We all want and wish that change to happen in Delhi for next generation we want to become a bridge between policy makers and the implementation process,” said Hitesh Vaidya, Director, National Institute of Urban Affairs (NIUA).
“We need a strong implementation mechanism for the Green Development Area Policy,” he added.
This policy will go in long way in curbing vehicular pollution and push real estate growth, said Niranjan Hiranandani, President, NAREDCO.
The idea is to bring NIUA, Naredco and DDA on the same platform and aim for a sustained and planned development in the city, said Gaurav Jain, vice president (North) NAREDCO.
The Delhi Development Authority (DDA) proposed to make modifications to Master Plan-2021 for incorporating the Green Development Area Policy under Section 11-A of DD Act 1957 and released a public notice announcing the same on February 24, 2021. The authority has requested for objections/suggestions to the policy to be shared within a period of Forty-Five (45) days (by 10th April 2021).
During the consultation event, the panelists brainstormed ideas on providing a comprehensive framework defining permissible uses, activities mix and FAR for proposed uses/activities for green development. They discussed environmentally sustainable development options to enable landowners to achieve economic value of lands as well as providing connectivity and infrastructure for physical and functional integration of the areas within and around the Green Development Area (GDA).
On April 5, Lt Governor Anil Baijal reviewed the draft of the Master Plan for Delhi-2041 at a meeting of the newly reconstituted advisory council of the DDA.
"Emphasised upon making MPD-2041 a common man's document by ensuring use of simple language along with adequate illustrations for the ease of understanding by end users," he had tweeted after the meeting.
The MPD-2041 endeavours for the first time to provide all development control norms at a single place for greater coherence and ready reference, Baijal said in a series of tweets.
"It envisages multi-agency coordination and monitoring of Delhi's development during the plan period through a dynamic multi-pronged framework having a key set of performance indicators (KPIs) under the aegis of a high-powered apex committee," he had added.
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