Chandigarh: The Chandigarh Housing Board has approved a framework permitting need-based changes inside its dwelling units — a decision that settles, in one stroke, a question that has run through the city’s housing estates for decades.
Under the framework, owners will be able to apply for a notified list of alterations: internal partition reconfiguration, kitchen and toilet relocation within the same service shafts, additional flooring treatment, and joinery changes — subject to structural certification and without any change to the building’s envelope.
The board’s own surveys estimated that a majority of its units built in the 1970s and 1980s already carry unauthorised internal alterations, the legacy of a strictness that made even non-structural change a violation. Regularisation fees, tiered by dwelling size, will fund a long-pending maintenance programme across the estates.
Property consultants expect the decision to firm values in the affected sectors almost immediately: titled, alterable units trade at a measurable premium in the city’s resale market.
Residents’ associations have asked for a single-window clearance and a time-bound approval schedule, saying the process must not replicate the queue that regularisation schemes created in neighbouring townships. The board is expected to notify application forms and the fee schedule within the month.
