Encroachment – the problem and solution

There is an urgent need to review the whole problem of encroachments, its causes, identification and enforcement. A policy need to be formulated on national level so that offenders may be noticed immediately and abuse of public property and roads may be contained. There are many types of encroachments. Some are big, some are small.

Parking of cars on pavements meant for use by pedestrians.
Putting up Gensets in front of shops/ houses etc.
Installation of signboards on shoulders of the roads.
Putting chairs etc. on roads and blocking free flow of traffic.
Stacking of building material.
Building Ramps.
Fencings in front of houses

In many cases land belonging to village panchayat, Municipal bodies, Development Authorities and Government has been encroached and sold on fake papers. Due to ignorance and rampant encroachment the people at times do not even think that they are encroaching upon public areas.
The encroachments can be broadly classified as under;

Moving encroachers – thelis, carts, vendors
Permanent encroachers – Dhabas, khokas, shops, ramps, fencings, road side shops, houses on public place
Parking encroachers – use of public property for parking and blocking available space
Mid road encroachers – by stopping by buses, autos to pick/ drop passengers.

The loss caused by these encroachers is very high in terms of pollution caused and law and issues. Whenever encroachments are removed, there is use of police force, road blocks, traffic disruption, eruption of law and order problem, use of public resources and disruption in normal and productive functioning of concerned officers and law enforcing machinery. There are uncountable nos. of violent incidents reported by press between encroachers and their supports with police, Government officials and other law enforcement agencies during removal of encroachments.

The loss caused due to encroachment on roads is unimaginable. Take the time wasted by a number of bureaucrats, officers, ordinary people, students, house wives who use roads due to varying nature - to attend offices, to fetch the children from schools etc. The plight of users of roads is best known to them. Also add the loss in productivity, the extra fuel burned, the extra wear and tear of idling vehicles, additional pollution caused and extra fuel burned due to encroachers.

There is substantial economic and social loss. The moods and tempers are affected often resulting in road rage cases. The cost of time not spent with family or in leisure. In short each day we under go a substantial loss every day.

The present system of saving public property from encroachers has failed – be it the property of Development Authorities, Municipal Authorities, government departments and police. In 60 years since independence the authorities have failed to formulate and publish a National Policy.

Do we care? Does anybody care? Does the police care? Does administrative officers care?

The only way to create space for planned development and ensure free flow of traffic is to prevent further encroachments and clear present and existing encroachments by creating a (non governmental) specialized tech savvy force on national level. The use of technology/ imaging and timely action is the only way to nip this problem in the bud. To avoid corruption and malpractices in identifying, prosecution and removal of encroachers technology driven evidences must be introduced by capturing images of encroachment. Fast track courts dedicated to deal with encroachment related cases may also be established to ensure timely and effective punishment.

The rampant encroachments of all sorts show total collapse of existing monitoring, enforcement and prevention machinery of various government departments.