Traders tense as panel defers de-sealing pleas

CHENNAI: The new year for the High Court-appointed monitoring committee began on a tense note after the Supreme Court pulled up the HC on relegating the T Nagar traders’ de-sealing application to the monitoring panel, as anxious and angry traders gathered in front of the Chennai Metropolitan Development Authority to know their fate.The HC had asked the business establishments to approach the committee and submit details about the building plan for removal of lock and seal. With the SC posting the hearing on Jan 9, barely a week before Pongal, traders from Ranganathan Street Merchants Association, Tamil Nadu Vanigar Sanghankalin Perammaipu and landowners who were present at the meet venue are keeping their fingers crossed. A M Vikramraja, the head of the TN Vanigar Sangam Peravai, who held deliberations with the Housing and Urban Secretary and vice-chairman of  the CMDA, has urged Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa to intervene so that shops could open during Pongal. “We are under pressure and many of the traders have incurred huge debt. This festival season is the only hope for traders. More than 1,500 people who have invested in chits in jewellery and utensils establishments in the area will be dejected if the building continues to be locked. This will create a law and order problem,” he warned.Member Secretary of CMDA, R Venkatesan, said the monitoring committee met the representatives who requested desealing and decided to defer the hearings for those who approached the committee following the SC order. “We hope by Jan 9 we will get a favourable order,” he said. Meenakshi of Meenakshi Real Estate alleged, “The authorities say that a fire engine will find it difficult to enter Ranganathan Street, but the truth is that it would not be able to turn into Ranganathan street because of the bridge built by the previous DMK government on Usman Road.”With the SC judgement, aspersions were being cast on the role of the monitoring panel by some sections of the Association of Professional Town Planners (APTP) alleging that it was appointed to examine the issues arising out of regularisation of unauthorised and deviated constructions, which had come up till Feb 28, 1999, during the First master plan.