Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation’s officials, on Wednesday, inspected and sealed the premises of an upmarket shopping mall functioning from the premises of a building which has not been issued the Occupancy Certificate yet.

Responding to the news article titled ‘Hyderabad malls open sans occupancy certificate, GHMC looks away’, published in The Hindu, Town Planning officials visited the premises and confirmed the violation, before issuing notices and sealing the premises.

A statement from GHMC informed that notices had been served upon the occupier calling for explanation and submission of relevant documents. The building permission was obtained by one T. Vinay Kumar and others for construction of three cellars and ground plus five floors for the purpose of commercial establishments and a multiplex. An inspection has revealed that a commercial establishment named ‘Mangalya Shopping Mall’ was being run in the ground and first floors of the building without occupancy certificate, the note said.

Since there was no response for the show cause notice, GHMC has taken action and sealed the ground and first floors of the building.

Shutters were pulled down by the officials and notices were pasted informing that the building had been seized under the section 461(A) of GHMC Act, 1955. Section 461(A) empowers the GHMC Commissioner to take action against the unauthorised structures, including removal, discontinuance of construction, and also to seal the property.

The Hindu, in its report published on Tuesday, focussed on violations pertaining to the occupancy certificates being condoned by the GHMC officials.

According to building norms, occupancy certificate is mandatory for any structure built on a plot of 200 square metres or more, or with a height of seven metres or more (typically ground plus one floor).

In order to enforce the OC, the GHMC mandates the builder to mortgage 10% of the built-up area with the corporation, by way of a notarised document. The mortgage is released only after issue of OC, and unless the OC is issued, the property cannot be occupied.

The note by GHMC too cautioned the public that the structures for which building permissions are obtained, can be occupied only after obtaining occupancy certificate as per the building norms.