LAHORE: To encourage construction activities in the provincial capital, the Lahore Development Authority (LDA) has decided to give a temporary permission for three-storey residential buildings without pillars in private housing schemes for the next six months.

The governing body of the LDA took the decision during a meeting held here on Tuesday which was chaired by LDA Vice Chairman S. M. Imran. Members of Provincial Assembly Sadia Sohail Rana, Umar Aftab and Muhammad Atif, WASA Vice Chairman Sheikh Imtiaz Mahmood, Major (R) Syed Burhan Ali, Amir Riaz Qureshi, LDA Director General Ahmed Aziz Tarar, WASA MD Syed Zahid Aziz, and representatives of concerned provincial departments attended the meeting. While keeping in mind the prevailing Coronavirus situation in the country, the meeting also approved the facility to pay map fee of multi-storey buildings in four equal quarterly instalments. In addition, the governing body decided to give a 25 percent discount in the sewerage augmentation charges to welfare organizations intending to build educational institutions and hospitals on their plots.

Moreover, the meeting also approved the construction of 35,000 affordable apartments in the city and agreed to amend its name from LDA City to LDA City Naya Pakistan Apartments. On the occasion, the Vice Chairman took notice of the discrepancy in Eid and utility allowances are given to the employees of LDA (UD Wing), WASA and TEA employees. Thus, he directed the officials concern to remove the anomaly and ensure that the employees in grade 1 to 16 employees receive the allowances at the same rate.

Moreover, the meeting also decided to increase the allowances of WASA and TEPA employees and give a monthly field allowance of Rs 3000 to the sub-engineers of WASA.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2020