"The last box in the strategic choice cascade is the most neglected. Often, senior management teams formulate strategy and then broadcast key themes to the rest of the company, expecting quick and definitive action. But even if you set a winning aspiration, determine where to play and how to win, and define the capabilities required, strategy can still fail - spectacularly - if you fail to establish management systems that support those choices and capabilities. Without supporting structures, systems, and measures, strategy remains a wish list, a set of goals that may or may not ever be achieved. To truly win in the marketplace, a company needs a robust process of creating, reviewing, and communicating about strategy; it needs structures to support its core capabilities; and it needs specific measure to ensure that the strategy is working" Quote from A.G. Lafley and Roger Martin's book 'Playing to Win'

The above quote is true for any company or government initiatives. Without a robust system to ensure proper implementation, regular reviews basis performance measures and corrective action on ground, good ideas might remain a pipe dream only.

Recently we had to face a peculiar situation with a neighbour's under construction independent house, which shares the boundary wall with our apartment complex. The general perception of buildings laws is that an independent house needs to leave setbacks on all sides but in this case the owner has built a servant quarter in the setback area. The servant quarter has been built on the shared wall of our apartment complex and raised in height above our boundary wall's electric fence. This illegal eyesore has become a problem for us since we share this wall with almost 10 independent houses. Such a precedent leaves our security and privacy in complete distress. Obviously reaching out to the owner has not got us any proper response. On the contrary he claims that he has approval to built the servant quarter in the setback area. Left with no other option, we have raised a compliant with GHMC few days back and got an acknowledgement. Inspite of personal follow-ups with GHMC no response let alone any action has been initiated. We are now contemplating the next steps to ensure this illegal structure is removed.

Recently the government announced a remarkable piece of policy i.e. Telangana State Building Permission Approval and Self-Certification (TS-bPASS). As per the relevant website 'Government of Telangana in tune with the Telangana Municipalities Act, 2019 has launched/introduced TS-bPASS, a single integrated platform for processing of various permissions required during development of land and construction of buildings through self-certification system. It is also designed to provide the services within stipulated timelines.'

The TS government should be lauded for such a landmark initiative to provide complete online services with no touchpoint for building approvals. This policy makes the much required distinction between requirements of small, mid and large approvals. Each segment of the approvals is treated separately, as it should be. A jist of the policy is as follows:

• For plot size up to 75 square yards (63 square meters) and the construction of ground or ground plus one floor (Residential) no building permission and occupancy certificate is required. Applicant is required to register with token of Rs.1.
• For plot size up to 500 square meters and height up to 10 meters (Residential) instant building plan approval through online self-certification.
• For plot size above 500 square meters and height above 10 meters (Residential & Non-Residential) there is single window system for obtaining multiple NOCs using Common Application Form and approval through online self-certification.

It is worth visiting the website http://tsbpass.telangana.gov.in and checking for oneself the policy and the online links that are available for building permission applications. The policy is a single window access which would mean that the all relevant departments are inter connected through the policy and need to give an answer within a stipulated period of time. The most attractive part of the website is that all relevant information about building approvals is available here including the relevant portions from other departments or agencies all listed out clearly for the benefit of the user. Getting all relevant GO's, departmental information, rules and regulations at a single place is a great relief.

Given our recent neighbourhood experience, was keen on checking the compliances aspect of the policy. Self-certification is a good policy but it would be naive to presume all will just follow the policy. A robust and active compliance system needs to be put in place for effective implementation of the self-certification process. The FAQ's on enforcement part of the policy need to give better comfort on the actual process and regulations to deal with non-compliance. The enforcement system seems dependent on somebody triggering a compliant about illegal construction or deviation.

In our experience the current system of complaining to GHMC seems time consuming and possibly futile considering the current workload of this agency. Invariably we will keep sending complaints to the senior officials and will have to pursue them quite hard before some action against the illegal servant quarter is taken up. The new policy has to be far better on this front. The special task force needs teeth and resources to check on-ground developments and take action. The government has taken up a new policy because the existing one probably failed to be citizen-friendly. The current policy also failed to ensure a planned and systematic development of the state and our city. The huge amount of BRS cases, many buildings not getting OC, heavy backlog of LRS cases, plethora of court cases pertaining to demolitions etc. are a testament to the failure of the current system. All this possibly has prompted a new policy initiative. The idea behind the new policy, seems to look at this critical function of the government with a fresh view and take a clean break from the murky past of illegal constructions, water body encroachments, demolitions, bad quality of building's etc.

For better implementation of the policy the compliance aspect needs more detailing and the same needs to be put up on the website. The user should know the pitfalls of non-compliance but more importantly should be able to figure out that the system will track non-compliance and put heavy penalties on the defaulter. One can imagine thousands of houses getting constructed over the next few decades to cater to the housing demands of the ever burgeoning population. Compliance will turn out to be the most important aspect of this good policy to ensure we do not get back to a similar situation as prevalent today.

The compliance aspect should also have a system like the 'no-fly' list with airlines wherein defaulters of this self-certification system should be blacklisted and not allowed to construct anything for a certain period of time preferably in years. When an offender breaks traffic rules, paying fines and becoming scot free is possibly the easiest thing to do. The offender needs to be made to spend possibly a day or two to learn about traffic rules, go through an exam to ensure understanding of the law is complete and sign a document to ensure they will comply in future, before they pay up. Violators need to know the price / time they should be willing to pay / spend for their violations. The policy has to completely avoid a situation in the future wherein regularisations schemes would have to be offered for the benefit of violators.

Technology should be used extensively to ensure compliance aspects of this policy to get the maximum benefit for all stakeholders including citizens, government and more importantly the state and our city. Remember a friend sharing an interesting incident when they visited Singapore. His son was enamoured by all the expensive cars while driving around in a taxi in Singapore. The taxi driver told the child, that there is no difference between the expensive cars and the taxi, as both have to run within the designated speed limit only otherwise errant drivers might loose their licence. This system in Singapore works perfectly due to technology. A huge intervention of technology is required in compliance aspects of TSbPASS to ensure nil misuse of this good law.