Customs Quarter Collapses
WE are told that a building in the Customs Colony in Goa collapsed on Saturday. Fortunately the dilapidated building was not occupied and so no one was injured. The quarters in many Customs and Central Excise Commissionerates are very old and due to lack of maintenance, they run the risk of falling down and causing great risk to human lives. It is by accident that people are surviving.
Of course there is another side to the story. In many cities, the CBEC has acquired quarters in most unwanted places and they are lying vacant for years together as there are no takers. Huge amounts of the tax payers' money is wasted in acquiring unwanted quarters and then keeping them vacant, because there are no takers. In many other departments, if a quarter is lying vacant, because there are no takers, it is simply allotted to the senior most officer and if he does not take it, his HRA is cut, but the Revenue Department has no such economic considerations. Quarters acquired at huge costs are kept vacant for years together, because nobody wants them. Several High Courts have held that HRA is not a right and an employee can be forcefully allotted a quarter and if he does not take it, his HRA can be cut.
CBEC should ascertain how many quarters are lying vacant and what they are doing about it. Even the CAG may consider doing an Audit on this.
But before that, they should take up a massive repair and re-construction of the dilapidated quarters. If there is no budget sanction for this, the Government should consider selling part of the land in which these quarters are constructed. Now they are all prime properties and if half of them are sold, that will take care of building super flats in the rest of the plots.