The Bhutanese Leading the way.
The works for Toribari town development project under Phuentsholing Thromde is expected to commence soon. Toribari is approximately 3 km away from Pasakha town and the project falls under one of Phuentsholing Thromde’s planned activities for the 12th plan.
The area is below the Kharbandi to Pasakha highway and the Thromde has allocated 340 acres of land for the Toribari town development.
Phuentsholing Thrompon Uttar Kumar Rai said that very recently they have completed the Local Area Plan (LAP) but they are still awaiting some of the plot owners to sign the kappa, and once they receive the kappa, they will then send it to the land commission for the lagthram.
He said, “Once they receive the Lagthram, then the plot owners can start construction works in Toribari. We are constructing the main town roads for now. However, from the second year of 12th Plan we want to start all the access roads. The area is plain, so we can finish the road work within a month.”
In addition to that he said they have already started with works on water supply. They have plans to construct infrastructure facilities like drainage, blacktopping the roads, schools and streetlights which the thromde has included in the second year of 12th plan.
He said they are not able to start the construction in the first year of 12th FYP because the budget has not been approved yet. Apart from infrastructure development, the land owners will have to bring in the development within the allocated plots.
Meanwhile, the Thrompon said they have issued the last notification to few households to vacate the house in Pasakha, just below the Bhalujohra Bridge as it is a government land. The owners have purchased the land from people who have absconded in the past and they do not have any legal documents to support that it is their private land, which is why they are asked to vacate the place, the Thrompon added.
“This issue has been always there. We cannot give lands for free and everybody has to pay the land tax. People have to get the government land either on lease or pay land tax if it’s their own but that area is neither on lease nor it’s their private land,” he added.
Nobody is allowed to encroach government lands and they have to dismantle the houses which were built on the government land, he added. There are eight households who were issued the notification to vacate and they have been issued repeated notifications in the past as well.
“If we to consider their reasons without any supporting legal documents than there will be many who will have the same reasons. So we cannot do anything but ask them to vacate the place before 31 January. Otherwise we will have to demolish as per the development control regulation,” he added.
