While presiding over the meeting of the Administrator's Advisory Council at the UT State Guest House here today, Chhibber said that the endeavour of the Administration was to work upon a master plan to be implemented jointly with Punjab and Haryana to ensure orderly growth and development to meet the future needs in and around Chandigarh. He, however, cautioned that the character, beauty and ecology of the city would not be allowed to be degraded at any cost.

Chhibber also called for taking long-term and short-term steps to meet the realities of population growth and demand for housing for the weaker sections and also to allow new avenues of employment and economic activities in the city.

He disclosed that following discussions about the master plan of Chandigarh held during the recently concluded architecture conference, the Administration has engaged a team of leading town planners under E.F.N. Ribeiro to prepare a basic proposal. Earlier, the meeting started with three items on its agenda, which was done for the first time, with members actively taking part in the discussion on issues of leasehold conversion rules, provision of basic amenities to villagers outside the lal dora and grant of licences to roadside vendors and workers. Various members after the discussions, reached a broad consensus on all the issues after giving suggestions. Some members also expressed concern over the changing character of the city, while some others held that the system has to adopt itself to the changes instead of strictly regulating the system.

Earlier Chhibber said that civic services to houses outside the lal dora were being provided to meet the genuine requirements of the people and not for encouraging racketeering by private dwellers. He said it was necessary to plan for growth and regularisation should not be treated as a green signal for anybody to make constructions wherever he liked. He also disclosed that in a survey conducted by the deputy commissioner's office, a total of 2,274 roadside vendors and workers were identified for provision of identity cards by the Administration. This was, however, opposed by some members saying the same would give further impetus to migrations. Other party leaders, including BJP, Congress, SJP and CPI supported the move.

Chhibber also welcomed the views of the members on the report of the committee on the issue of conversion of dwelling units from leasehold to freehold, which suggested relaxation of certain conversion rules and adopting a single-window system. The committee had recently submitted its report which was put up before the Advisory Council for opinion. Members, including local MP Satya Pal Jain, suggested to the Administration to further simplify the rules and also allow the transfer of property on the basis of General Power of Attorney (GPA), after recognising it. They also called for reduction of transfer rates from the existing 12 per cent to 6 per cent as in Punjab. Jain also called for making the Apartments Act applicable in Chandigarh.

Regarding provision of facilities outside the lal dora, members suggested that no policy of `pick-and-choose' should be adopted. Adviser Jagdish Sagar talked about financial problems in providing civic amenities outside lal dora. Jain later offered to provide money from his MP Development quota, which had now increased from Rs 1 crore to Rs 2 crore.

Mayor Kewal Krishan Adiwal, BJP president Dharam Paul Gupta, present and former CTCC presidents Pawan Kumar Bansal and Venod Sharma, SJP president Devinder Singh Babla, BSP president M.R. Dhiman, SAD president Gurpratap Singh Riar, Inderjit Singh Grewal of CPI and others actively participated in the discussions.

Senior officers including also participated in the meeting.