Delhi

Beautifying Jama Masjid Area

Under the Delhi Master Plan the Jama Masjid area is proposed to be redeveloped and the plot in front of mosque converted into a modern park. According to a new project sanctioned under the Master Plan, the proposed park will extend to the western boundary of Elgin Road and will be bounded by Edward Park in the south by a new road linking Elgin road with Esplanade Road in the north. The park will have four gates, the main gate being on the Elgin Road. It will have lawns, pedestrian walks, pathways, water channels, pools and fountains or cascades and a reflecting pool about 132 feet square in the Moghul tradition.

The pathways, roads and compounds will be lighted by low-level trough lights. Arrangements will be made for flood lighting the mosque on special occasions. Ornamental lights will be provided for fountains and pools.

The area to the east of Jama Masjid will be developed into a piazza, with plinth shops, red-stone pavements and steps.

The existing junk and pavement shops around the mosque will be removed to the Jhandewala and pavement shops to a shopping complex being developed on the north side of the mosque. The complex will have. shops, offices and houses for slum dwellers. Cycle stalls on Esplanade Road will be shifted Jhandewala.

Case Of A Cinema House

Can a cinema house be built in a locality marked "residential" under the Delhi Master Plan? This question is being examined by the Delhi Corporation, which has been approached to sanction a building plan for a cinema house in Lajpat Nagar. Under the building bylaws a cinema house cannot be built within 500 feet of a petrol pump or a school. The proposed site is near Lady Shri Ram College. The location has been approved by the Delhi Development Authority. Under the Master Plan, a cinema house can be located within the commercial pocket of a

residential area. The DDA is understood to have approached the Government of India. with powers to make changes in the land use as specified in the Master Plan. More than two years ago, a building application by the owners of the cinema site to Delhi Corporation was rejected. The owners later referred the matter to the DDA, which told the Corporation it had no objection to the plot being used as a cinema site.

Unauthorised Constructions

The Tagore Theatre and police barracks under construction on the New Delhi Ridge and private automobile shop in Mandir Marg were characterised as unauthorised constructions at a meeting of the New Delhi Municipal Committee on August 9. Mr. Gajraj Singh, President of the NDMC, said that these constructions had been undertaken without the approval of the civie body and therefore they violated the Master Plan of Delhi. He said the NDMC was not compe tent under the Delhi Developments Authority Act to take action against Government Departments if they did not seek its approval before undertaking construction of any building. He told the Committee that such unauthorised constructions would not be sanctioned electricity and water connections and other municipal services. Satellite Townships

are

being

Faridabad and Ghaziabad developed as satellite townships to relieve the shortage of office and residential accommodation in Delhi. Mr. Mehar Chand Khanna, Union Minister for Works, Housing and Supply, told the Parliament's Informal Consultative Committee, on August 26 that as far as Faridabad was concerned all work on the development of land had already been. taken up. About 230 acres of land is to be developed in Faridabad to provide 1,150 residential units and office buildings with. 1.50 lak square feet of accommodation. The whole scheme is expected to cost Rs. 1.66

crores.

About 900 acres of land would be acquired in Ghaziabad where multi-storey office

buildings and residential quarters to accommodate about 20,000 employees would be constructed.

These townships are being developed in accordance with Delhi's Master Plan which has recommended setting up of four satellite. townships around Delhi in the interest of planned development of the Metropolitan city and to accommodate about 50,000 Central Government employees. The other two townships are to be developed near Narela and Gurgaon.

About 15,000 acres of land on both sides of the Grand Trunk Road, from Badarpur to Ballabhgarh, will be acquired by the Punjab State Government under Section 4 of the Land Acqusition Act, for being utilised for the setting up of industrial esate and satellite townships under the Greater Delhi Master Plan.

Madras

Master Plan For Madras City

Madras Health Minister, Mrs. Jothi Venkatachellum, told the Madras. State Assembly on August 9, that a Centrallysponsored scheme for the preparation of a Master Plan for Madras City Metropolitan Area had been sanctiored, and that the Master Plan expected to be ready by 1967 end.

The object of the scheme, she said, was to prepare an outline development plan in the first stage and a detailed Master Plan ultimately for Madras City Metropolitan Area. The initial staff required for the preparation of the Master Plan has also been

sanctioned. The collection of preliminary data required for the preparation of the Master Plan was being done.

Mrs. Venkatachellum said a team of American experts, headed by Mr. Walter Harris of Yale University, which visited Madras City sometime ago, had made a report to the State Government recommending the establishment of an Institute of Planning for post-graduate education in Town and Country Planning. The Government was examining the details of the establishment of the Institute, estimated to cost

Rs. 9 laks non-recurring and Rs. 2.40 laks per annum recurring. The preparation of the Master Plan for Madras City, would be undertaken by this Institute, she added. Pavement Dwellers

Industries Minister, Mr. Venkataraman, told the House that according to a survey conducted by the State Housing Board of the slum dwellers in Madras City, includingg pavement dwellers, during November, 1961, to June, 1962, there were about 5,600 families of pavement dwellers in the city. He said three projects had been formulated for the rehabilitation of pavement dwellers. Four hundred and three families had already been rehabilitated at a cost of Rs. 5,20,800.

Orissa

Bhubaneshwar Master Plan

The Orissa Government has decided to draw up a Master Plan to develop Bhubaneshwar. The State Capital, it is envisaged, would be expanded up to Khurda Road in the south, the Khukhai river bridge in the north, the Daya river bridge in the east and the Khandagiri-Baran Road in the west. West Bengal

Haldia Port To Be Renamed Tamralipta

The West Bengal Cabinet as decided that the proposed port at Haldia, 80 miles downstream on the Hooghly from Calcutta should be renamed Tamralipta. Very close to Haldia, the ancient port of Tamralipta dates back to Neolithic times. It was the port from which the great Buddhist mission of Emperor Asoka left for Ceylon. The mission comprised Mahendra and Sanghamitra who carried the holy Bodhidruma Sapling to Ceylon.

Tamralipta was also referred to in Dandi's Dasakumar Charita (stories of Ten princes written in the 6th century A. D.) in which there is a romantic story of a Magdha prince Mitragupta having a duel with the local prince Bhima Dhanvan in the river flowing past Tamralipta.

In those days Tamralipta was the centre of Buddhist learning in India, and no foreign (Continued on page 40)