Expressing satisfaction over the largest mock drill conducted by the Delhi Government, Lieutenant Governor Tejendra Khanna on Friday came out with a number of suggestions to tackle the issue which includes developing “standard structural design” for all buildings depending on soil quality of areas and giving Government grant to retrofit weak structures; opening of consultancy wing for structural evaluation and setting up Disaster Response Force at the State level.

Noting that unsafe buildings are a matter of great concern as Delhi sits on a highly quake-prone zone, Khanna said he has asked MCD and NDMC to immediately appoint consultants capable of carrying out structural safety review of buildings.

Khanna was speaking after chairing a high-level meeting which discussed a number of issues, including performance of various agencies and shortcomings during the mega mockdrill on Wednesday, and the problem of unsafe buildings.  “The MCD has been told to set up a consultancy wing so that owner of any house owner wanting to carry out structural evaluation of his or her house can get the service,” said Khanna, adding experts from the Central Building Research Institute (CBRI) in Roorkee have also agreed to provide technical support for the purpose. Khanna said experts from the Delhi Technical University and Delhi IIT can be roped in for evaluating structural safety of buildings. The Lieutenant Governor also suggested that MCD should start registering of structural engineers.

Emphasising the need to retrofit the unsafe buildings, Khanna said house owners could be given financial grant, depending on the economic condition, to encourage them to strengthen weak buildings. “We can extend financial grant for retrofitting of weak buildings. The size of the grant should depend on income of the house owners. The Principal Secretary of Urban Development department has been told to present the issue before Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit,” he said.

The L-G also mooted the idea of having “standard structural design” for various areas depending on the soil condition, saying such mandatory design parametres would ensure construction of safe buildings. “The soil condition of various areas of the city are different. So, we should have standard structural design stipulating parametres such as depth of foundation, load- bearing capacity and size of beams,” Khanna said, adding expertise from Delhi Technical University can be taken to make such structural design.

Khanna also suggested that the Urban Shelter Improvement Board, whose basic role is to facilitate

low-cost houses for the poor, should set up a separate wing for replacing weak buildings on request of house-owners.

“The DUSIB should have an executing agency. If three-four house owners come and say we want our weak buildings to be replaced by a safe building, then DUSIB should be able to do it,” he said.

Maintaining that redevelopment of areas should be increased, Khanna said if a building has a floor area ratio (FAR) of 100, then for redevelopment, he referred to the provision in the Master Plan of Delhi and said as per norms the permissible floor space would go up on redevelopment of a building. The additional space could be sold or allowed for commercial purpose also and this kind of policy would attract private developers also, Khanna said.

According to Khanna, keeping in view of National Disaster Response Force, there is also need to set up a disaster response force at state level so that they could be trained properly. The Government may also hire a battalion of Delhi Armed Police Force and train them.

The L-G said that the audit by Army on the mockdrill shows that response of Delhi Police PCR van was good and it reached on time on 19 places on Wednesday, while the fire department stood number two in responding to such incidents.