In a Notification dated 10th February, 2020, the Government of National Capital Territory of Delhi has issued an Action Plan for making buildings seismically compliant in the areas of South Delhi Municipal Corporation, North Delhi Municipal Corporation and East Delhi Municipal Corporation.
Background:
The present notification is in continuation of the Action Plan adopted by the Notification dated 24th April, 2019. In order to make buildings in Delhi seismically compliant, the earlier notification dated 24th April, 2019 dealt with various aspects like the seismic safety in case of new buildings and existing buildings, structure audit of old buildings, the time frame and implementation of the Action Plan and the eligibility and empanelment of structural engineers.
Various discussions and meetings were held keeping the said Action Plan in mind, after which additions were made to the Action plan which are now issued through the present Gazette Notification.
Key takeaways from the Action Plan:
- Any owner/applicant, at the time of submitting application for building permit must submit a certificate of Structural Safety from a designated Structural Engineer stating that he will adhere to the Structural Safety requirements in accordance to National Building Code 2016 Part-IV.
- More engineers will be empanelled keeping in mind the large number of properties that have to be evaluated. These engineers can be approached by the citizens and residents for securing certificates and for queries related to the structural safety of the units and other relevant details.
- A list of responsible officers who can be approached by the citizens will be uploaded in the website of the relevant departments. Names and contact numbers of responsible officers at the zonal level from the department will be placed on the website.
- Delhi falls in the Seismic Zone-IV. But there is vulnerability in different areas. For high risk areas, evaluation will be done immediately within a short time span and on the second and third phase, other zones like Moderate or Low Risk zones can be taken up for evaluation.
Evaluation of buildings having height more than 15 metres will be done phase wise.
Buildings will also be classified on the basis of their construction i.e. old, very old / new and their evaluation will be done phase wise.
Please note that the evaluation of all such types of buildings will be started immediately after the approval of the Action Plan, phase-wise and the onus will lie on the owner / occupier of the existing building(s) to get their building(s) evaluated within stipulated time frame from empanelled structural engineer and subsequently carry out the upgradation / strengthening / retro-fitting, if required as per the evaluation of the said building.
Source: Delhi Gazette
