Time running out on 'time bomb'.

Unauthorised construction is a "time bomb", said the Delhi High Court recently. The Supreme Court ordered the removal of all encroachments on public space. The Court had told municipal authorities not to allow unauthorised construction in 2004 but its order was ignored. Obeying the Court's order can be dangerous. An officer was shot to death in Kasauli in Himachal Pradesh because she refused a bribe from a hotel owner not to seal an illegal structure. This being India, there could be more to the story than we are being told. The hotel owner could have paid bribes to other officers previously to allow him to build the illegal structure and may have been enraged by what he sees as a betrayal and waste of money. He cannot say that because politicians and civil servants have protected themselves by passing a law that punishes a bribe giver equally as the taker of a bribe. No wonder, in a survey 45% of Indians admitted to having paid a bribe in the last one year. Unauthorised colonies are nothing other than land grabbing in the name of the poor. Politicians promise to make them legal, or 'regularise', before an election. This breeds a feeling of immunity that being poor excuses breaking the law. An engineer, inspecting theft of electricity, died when his car crashed as he tried to flee a mob armed with iron rods and hockey sticks. Another engineer suffered head injury when checking for electricity theft at an apartment in Ghaziabad. We are not talking about building a small hovel with one-brick walls, covered with tarpaulin or metal sheets. Authorities in Noida have stopped illegal buildings consisting of 6 to 9 floors without planning permission. Strangely, no one ever goes to prison for the serious crime of land grabbing and building illegal, unsafe structures. In the Campa Cola case residents have been evicted from their apartments because these were built illegally but it means that those who have been conned have been punished while the cheats and officials, who took bribes, to allow the cheats to build the flats are allowed to enjoy their spoils. Officials should have stopped the extra floors by taking out an injunction. People take their cue from politicians. Former Chief Minister of Bihar, Lalu Prasad Yadav was sentenced to 14 years in prison for stealing money. All this time he was in good health and even celebrating by-election victories through social media. Suddenly he decided to get admitted in the All India Institute of Medical Science, a tertiary hospital, in Delhi. Goons of his party created a disturbance in the hospital when he was discharged and Lalu called it a "political vendetta". When the top is rotten the system is rotten. Breaking the law becomes a right.