KOLKATA - Clearance from the fire services would henceforth be mandatory for issuing trade licenses for shopping malls, multiplexes, cinema halls and restaurants in Kolkata Municipal Corporation areas.

In a pre-monsoon survey done by the Maharashtra Housing Area Development Authority (MHADA), the number of old and dilapidated buildings in the city for the current year is 78. Addressing the press, Chairman of MHADA Sachin Ahir announced the number of dilapidated buildings in the city.

Contrary to claims made by the Delhi urban development minister Raj Kumar Chauhan on Monday, the flyover plan to decongest the pilot Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) corridor is very much on. The transport department has ordered a Detailed Project Report (DPR) for the project on Wednesday and construction is expected to start soon.

The Commonwealth Games basketball and squash courts, being built in Siri forest area in south Delhi, should be relocated to another site as it involved large-scale cutting of full-grown trees, amicus curiae Harish Salve said in his fresh plea before the Supreme Court. The application, which is scheduled to be heard by the Forest Bench comprising Chief Justice K G Balakrishnan and Justices Arijit Pasayat and S H Kapadia on Friday, said already 836 trees, each over 100-years-old, were cut to make way for the 30,000 sq metre concrete courts for the games.

Since its inauguration five years ago, the 23.5-km Greater Noida Expressway has claimed over 45 lives. In the same period, more than 60 people have been injured in mishaps.

CONSTRUCTION of 10 lakh houses for the poor and lower middle class and a load-shedding free Maharashtra will be on the agenda of the state government for the next two years, Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh announced in Mumbai on Wednesday. He said that whatever land the State government has freed after the scrapping of the Urban Land Ceiling and Regulation Act (ULCRA), would be used up for providing affordable houses for the lower and middle classes in the State.

THE Maharashtra Government will implement an ambitious programme to build ten lakh houses for poor and middle class people in the next two years, Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh said today on the eve of the 48th Maharashtra Day. "Maharashtra is the most progressive state in the country and has given direction to the country," Deshmukh said in his message. "The new housing policy of the government is being discussed in the country and the government has already announced providing 270 sq feet houses to slum-dwellers under the slum rehabilitation scheme," he said. PTI

on march 19, Maharashtra increased the floor space index (fsi) ratio in Mumbai's suburbs. State finance minister Jayant Patil said the new fsi will be 1.33. Earlier the figure was one. The

Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi's two-day visit to Dibrugarh district was filled with series of development projects. The 'improvement and strengthening' of Moran-Naharkatia PWD road, to cost Rs 56 crore, and the construction of Saraighat Bridge over river Burhidehing under Lahoal development block at a cost of Rs 21 crore were the two most ambitious projects among others that were initiated by the Chief Minister during his visit.