A Civic Body with a Mandate for Guwahati's Development

Kindly elaborate on GMDAs ongoing work and future plans in relation to restoration of water bodies in the city?

One of the bigger projects that the GMDA is currently engaged in is the project of rejuvenation of water bodies in the city like the Silsako Beel and the Borsola Beel. Silsako, the largest among the water bodies inside the city limits, is plagued with issues of sewage water flow into it thereby degrading the quality of water, rampant encroachment causing area shrinkage and the consequent incapability of the lake to retain large volume of storm water. In fact, the beel has lost more than 60% of its area to encroachers.

The Silsako Beel Project is the largest one and provides a natural setting with an emergent urban edge. Ecologically it is of great significance as an area supporting different food chains and food webs, recharging ground water and is habitat to significant biodiversity having ecological and economic value. GMDA intends to leverage its natural setting to address the storm water management system for the City.

The current initiative of the GMDA that focuses on improvement of the water bodies in the City has two major objectives; the first to improve the quality of the water in the bodies and the second to enhance its water retention capacity by expanding its area. The strategy adopted by the GMDA to achieve the objectives includes clearing encroachers from the wetland that is protected under the Guwahati Waterbodies (Preservation and Conservation) Act 2008, excavating the core area of the wetland to increase its water retention capacity for excess storm water from the city to be discharged and ensure smooth discharge of the storm water through the Bonda channel into the Brahmaputra. A corollary to this is to ensure that a substantial amount of water from the Bahini river is diverted to the Silsako Beel early in its course rather than allow all the storm water to be carried through to the Bharulumukh outfall point. This is expected to mitigate water logging in a large part of the City during the monsoons.

What are your plans and initiatives in terms of maintaining and growing the greenbelt of the city? Do you agree that there probably needs to be some bird sanctuary in the vicinity of the city. If yes, where and how can this be cultivated / developed? If No, why do you feel so?

The principal mandate that the Honourable Chief Minister has laid for the GMDA is the creation of green open spaces for the citizens. Guwahati has never had too many open recreational public spaces all these years and the number of such spaces that were available could not cater to the requirements of the population. Old projects that were in cold storage for many years have come back into focus and the state government as committed significant amount of funds for the execution of these projects.

One of the bigger open space initiatives in Guwahati is the Botanical Garden being created over approximately 12 acres of what used to be the Old Jail campus in Fancy Bazar. The Garden, when completed, will have more than 100 different species of trees/ plants and is expected to be our own little Central Park. A small and pretty park is coming up in Hengrabari over a hilly 12 bigha parcel of land. This park will also be the location for a state- of- the- art roller skating infrastructure among others. Nehru Park in Panbazar is being redeveloped too.

The Silsako wetland, once developed as per plan, will see large sections with planned tree cover. This will in all likelihood attract birds to the area. In November/ December 2021, while the wetland was being excavated, various species of migratory birds were seen. It is expected that the beel will be a place for avifauna in the days ahead.

What are some of the latest measures/reforms that GMDA has introduced/implemented in terms of granting building permissions for commercial and residential real estate projects? Please explain the rationale behind introducing these measures. Many people in Guwahati today feel that the sale and purchase of land has become cumbersome because of the complexity of the steps involved. Your comments on this please

Land Sale Permissions, Land Use Certificates and building permits are currently being issued online by the GMDA, most of them within the timelines specified in the Bye Laws. The intent and purpose is to ensure that citizens have bare minimum interface with officials and officials have no scope to harass them. There has been a marked improvement in service delivery in the GMDA since the new government has taken over. The government is in the process of notifying a single window system to facilitate the issue of building permits only via online mode within stipulated timelines. Under this system, payment of fees for the services will also have to be made online. Once the single window system is notified, citizens can expect faster and hassle free issue of all kinds of building permissions.

GMDA also implements, together with GMC, a reform scheme named the Mukhya Montri Griha Nirman Asoni under which land owners with land parcels ranging from 0.4 lessas to 2.5 kathas can obtain permits online for up to G+2 floors. This scheme has been a resounding success as it has allowed citizens to use the services of empanelled technical personnel (architects) to obtain permissions on their behalf without having to undertake visits to offices.

Since the sale/ purchase of land envisage investment of a lot of money, citizens ought to ascertain details of the land parcel and the kind of structure that is allowed to be constructed over the plot under the bye laws prior to taking a decision on such sale/ purchase. Land classification as per revenue records differ from the land use allowed under the Bye Laws so what could appear to be an activity permitted by a reading of the land document may not be the activity that is permitted under the Master Plan/ Bye Laws.

A large part of GMDA's mandate is to ensure that along with modernization of infrastructure and civic amenities the historical essence of Guwahati is maintained. Could you elaborate on your key initiatives and plans in this regard?

The development of a stretch of the Guwahati Riverfront is an initiative of the State Government that is being implemented by the GMDA. Under this initiative, the erstwhile residence of the Deputy Commissioner in Panbazar and its premises have been restored and conserved as the Mahabahu Brahmaputra River Heritage Centre. This centre is now being integrated with the adjoining area that contains a pond, known as the Padumpukhuri, to create a very large contoured open space with plazas and with promenades at different levels alongside the Brahmaputra. This will allow the citizens to now explore areas and views of the Brahmaputra that they had no access to until very recently. The Padumpukhuri, a historical water body, is being developed as the chief element in the to-be integrated area.

The stretch beyond the Padumpukhuri till the South Terminal of the Guwahati Ropeway will also see large open spaces, plazas and promenades in the years ahead. The space around the south terminal of the Ropeway will be developed on the lines of Dilli Haat offering citizens more access to the river.

Could you share a little about the latest technological innovations at GMDA? Also in terms of the overall development mandate of Guwahati, which Indian cities (or even other countries) have served as role models? Or rather is it an amalgamation of various best practices?

GMDA is digitizing all pre-2014 files relating to permissions so that Occupancy Certificates can be issued based on those permissions. Since GMDA has space constraints maintenance of physical files and records has become a challenge. Services are mostly available online. Good practices from across India are of course sought to be replicated, albeit with customization.

Your thoughts on ongoing eviction drives in terms of illegal encroachments

Encroachers who have taken over our water bodies in the City must vacate the land as their encroachment has caused shrinking of the land available for storm water accumulation and drainage and has resulted in the development of myriad other problems for other city dwellers including waterlogged streets and houses.

Finally, what is GMDAs vision for 2025?

Oh! Many, many things! The Comprehensive Mobility Plan for one, constitution of a Unified Metropolitan Transport Authority, a Digital Master Plan for the area under GMDA, Satellite Townships, a Local Area (Redevelopment) Plan for 300 Ha of land over Fancy Bazar- Uzan Bazar area and, who knows, perhaps even the ground breaking for a Mass Rapid Transport System!

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