The Town Planning Department of the Thane Municipal Corporation (TMC) in Maharashtra has gone online with a dedicated portal launched to clear building proposals. It offers online application for building plan approval, proposal status tracking, and citizen search for approval details, TDR proposal application and status tracking.
The portal is integrated to SMS and payment gateways. The portal uses “AutoDCR” a product developed by Pune-based company, SoftTech Engineers, for providing online building plan scrutiny and approval using CAD based technology. The GIS enabled system allows full geo-referencing of drawings submitted.
According to Thane civic officials, the building plans will be sanctioned online. “Once an architect submits a proposal to the planning department, he need not make rounds of the corporation office to check for a written okay. Director or other equivalent officer will scrutinise the proposal online and approve it,” an official said.
“A delay in issuing the clearance will have to be justified,” he added. “Thane is small city and there are no major developments like Mumbai. So it will work effectively,” RA Rajeev, Thane Municipal Commissioner said.
Vijay Gupta, Chairman and CEO, SoftTech Engineers said, “We have worked with more than 30 corporations in India on similar initiatives. The issues and challenges of Thane were unique as development rules were complex and led to complexities in their approval.”