Kolkata Municipal Corporation Act, 1980

No: 59 Dated: Dec, 28 1981

THE KOLKATA MUNICIPAL CORPORATION ACT, 1980

West Bengal Act LIX of 1980

    An Act to amend and consolidate the law relating to the municipal affairs of Kolkata.

    Whereas it is expedient to amend and consolidate, in the manner hereinafter appearing, the law relating to the municipal affairs of Kolkata;

    It is hereby enacted in the Thirty-first year of the Republic of India, by the Legislature of West Bengal, as follows :

Part I

CHAPTER I

Preliminary

1. Short title, application and commencement.- (1) This Act may be called the Kolkata Municipal Corporation Act, 1980.

(2) Except as hereinafter otherwise provided in this Act, it applies only to Kolkata.

(3) It shall come into force on such date" as the State Government may, by notification, appoint.

2. Definitions.- In this Act, unless the context otherwise requires—

(1) an article shall be deemed to be "adulterated"—

(a) in the case of drugs, if its strength, quality or purity falls below the professed standard under which it is sold or exposed for sale;

(b) in the case of confectionery, if it contains any mineral substance or poisonous colouring of flavouring matter or other ingredients deleterious or detrimental to health: and

(c) in the case of food,—

(i) if any substance has been mixed or packed with it so as to reduce or lower or harmfully affect its quality or strength, or

(ii) if any substance has been substituted wholly or in part for the article, or

(iii) if any normal constituent of the article has been wholly or in part abstracted, or

(iv) if it is mixed, coloured, powdered, coated or stained in a manner whereby deterioration or inferiority is concealed, or

(v) if it does not comply with the standard prescribed therefor by or under this Act or under any other law for the time being in force, or

(vi) if it contains or is mixed or diluted with any substance in any quantity to the prejudice of the purchaser or consumer or in any proportion which diminishes in any manner its food value or nutritive properties as compared with the same in a pure or normal state and in an un-deteriorated and sound condition, or

(vii) if it contains any added poisonous or other added deleterious ingredient which may render such article injurious to health, or

(viii) if it is not of the nature, substance or quality which it purports or is represented to be;

(3) "assessment-book" means the municipal assessment book referred to by section 191 and includeS any books subsidiary thereto;

(3A) "base unit area value" means the uniform rate per square feet of any land comprising any building and any vacant land or covered space of building, or portion thereof, as the case may be, to be determined, under sub-section (1) of section 174, by the Municipal Valuation Committee;

(4) "budget-grant" means a sum entered on the expenditure side of the Budget Estimates which have been finally adopted, and includes any sum by which a budget-grant is at any time increased by a transfer under clause (c) of sub-section (1) of section 132;

(5) "building" means a structure constructed for whatsoever purpose and of whatsoever materials and includes the foundation, plinth, walls, floors, roofs, chimneys, fixed platforms, verandas, balcony, cornice or projection or part of a building or anything affixed thereto or any wall (other than a boundary wall less than three metres in height) enclosing or intended to enclose any land, signs and outdoor display structures but does not include a tent, samiana or tarpaulin shelter;

(6) "building-line" means the line which is in rear of the street alignment and up to which the main wall of a building on a land abutting on a street or projected public street may lawfully extend;

(7) "building of the warehouse class" means a building, the whole or a substantial part of which is used, or intended to be used, as a warehouse, factory, manufactory, brewery, or distillery, or for any similar purpose, which is neither a "domestic building" nor a "public building" as defined in this section, and includes a but used or intended to be used for any of the purposes mentioned in this clause;

(8) "bustee" means an area containing land not less than seven hundred square metres in area occupied by or for the purposes of any collection of huts or other structures used or intended to be used for human habitation.

Explanation.—If any question arises as to whether any particular area is or is not a bustee, the Corporation shall decide the question and its decision shall be final;

(9) "Kolkata" means the area described in Schedule I;

(11) "carriage" means any wheeled vehicle, with springs or other appliances acting as springs, which is ordinarily used for the conveyance of human beings, and includes a jin-rickshaw, cycle-rickshaw, bicycle or tricycle; but does not include a perambulator or other form of vehicle designed for the conveyance of small children;

(12) "cart" means any cart, hackney of wheeled vehicle with or without springs, which is not a "carriage" as defined in this section. and includes a hand-cart, or a cycle van or a push van but does not include any wheeled vehicle which is propelled by mechanical power or its trailer;

(13) "category A post" means a category A post classified as such under section 17;

(14) "category B post" means a category B post classified as such under section 17;

(15) "category C post" means a category C post classified as such under section 17;

(16) "category D post" means a category D post classified as such under section 17;

(17) "Chairman" means the Chairman elected under section 6;

(18) "connected-privy" means a privy which is directly connected with a sewer;

(19) "connected-urinal" means a urinal which is directly connected with a sewer;

(21) "Corporation" means the Kolkata Municipal Corporation established under this Act;

(23) "cubical extent", with reference to the measurement of a building, means the space contained within the external surfaces of its walls and roof and the upper surface of the floor of its lowest or only storey;

(24) "dairy" includes any farm, cattle-shed, cow-house, milk-store, milk shop or other place —

(a) from which milk is supplied on or for sale, or

(b) in which milk is kept for purposes of sale or used for manufacture or preparation for sale of —

(i) butter, or

(ii) ghee, or

(iii) cheese, or

(iv) curds, or

(v) dried, sterilized, condensed or toned milk,

but does not include—

(a) a shop or other place in which milk is sold for consumption on the premises only, or

(b) a shop or other place from which milk is sold or supplied in hermetically closed and unopened receptacles in the same original condition in which it was first received in such shop or other place;

(25) "dairyman" includes any occupier of a dairy, any cow-keeper who trades in milk, or any wholesale or retail seller of milk;

(26) "dangerous disease" means—

(a) cholera, plague, small-pox, cerebrospinal meningitis, diphtheria, tuberculosis, leprosy, influenza, encephalitis, poliomyelitis and syphilis; and

(b) any other epidemic, endemic, or infectious disease which the State Government may, by notification, declare to be a dangerous disease for the purposes of this Act;

(27) "depot" means a place where articles are stored, whether for sale or for any other purpose but not for domestic consumption or use, in quantities exceeding two thousand kilo grams;

(28) "domestic building" includes a dwelling-house and any other masonry building which is neither a building of the warehouse class nor a public building as defined in this section nor a place exclusively used for private worship;

(29) "domestic purposes", in relation to the supply of water means the purposes other than those referred to in sub-section (2) of section 238;

(30) "drain" includes a sewer, a house-drain, a drain of any other description, a tunnel, a culvert, a ditch, a channel and any other device for carrying off sullage, sewage, offensive matter, polluted water, rain-water or sub-soil water:

(31) "drug" means any substance used as medicine or in the composition or preparation of medicines, whether for internal or external use of human beings or animals and all substances intended to be used for, or in the diagnosis, treatment, mitigation or prevention of diseases in human beings or animals, and shall also include medicines and substances exclusively used or prepared for use in accordance with the Ayurvedic system of medicine or Unani system of medicine but does not include a drug within the meaning of sub-clause (ii) of clause (b) of section 3 of the Drugs and Cosmetics Act, 1940 (23 of 1940);

(32) "dwelling-house" means a masonry building constructed, used or adapted to be used wholly or principally for human habitation;

(33) "edible oil" means coconut oil, cotton seed oil, groundnut oil, olive oil, and til (sesame) oil, in their pure state, linseed oil, mahua oil, mustard oil, rapeseed oil, poppy seed oil, sunflower oil, tara mira oil, niger seed oil, soyabean oil, maize oil, palm oil, palm karnel oil, water melon seed oil, in their pure state, imported salad oil labelled as such, any vegetable oil, prepared by hardening process such as hydrogenation and labelled as such and bearing in the label in English and Bengali the names of the oils entering into its composition and any other oil which the State Government may, by notification, declare to be an edible oil for the purpose of this Act;

(34) "edible fat" means prepared in a manner approved by the Chief Municipal Health Officer from healthy goats, sheeps, pigs, cows, buffaloes, or any other animal which the State Government may, by notification, specify for the purposes of this clause;

(35) "elected member" means an elected Councillor;

(38) "filtered water" means water intended for domestic use and tested for its potability and purity and found fit for such use;

(39) "food" includes every article used for food or drink by man, other than drugs or water, and any article which ordinarily enters into or is used in the composition or preparation of human food, and also includes confectionery, flavouring and colouring matters, spices and condiments;

(40) "footpath" means a category VI road which abuts a category I or category II or category III or category IV road;

(41) "habitable room" means a room constructed or adapted for human habitation;

(42) "half-year" means half of a year;

(42A) "heritage building" means any building of one or more premises, or any part thereof, which requires preservation and conservation for historical, architectural, environmental or ecological purpose, and includes such portion of the land adjoining such building or any part thereof as may be required for fencing or covering or otherwise preserving such building, and also includes the areas and buildings requiring preservation and conservation for the purpose as aforesaid under sub-clause (II) of clause (a) of sub-section (4) of section 31 of the West Bengal Town and Country (Planning and Development) Act, 1979 (West Bengal Act 13 of 1979);

(42B) "Heritage Conservation Committee" means the Heritage Conservation Committee constituted under sub-section (1) of section 425D

(43) "house-drain" means any drain of one or more premises used for the drainage of such premises;

(44) "house-gully" means a passage or a strip of land constructed, set apart or utilized for the purpose of serving as a drain or of affording access to a privy, urinal, cesspool or other receptacle for filthy or polluted matter to municipal employees or to persons employed in the cleaning thereof or in the removal of such matter therefrom and includes the air space above such passage or land;

(45) "hut" means any building, no substantial part of which excluding the walls up to a height of fifty centimetres above the floor or floor level is constructed of masonry, reinforced concrete, steel, iron or other metal;

(46) "infectious disease" or "communicable disease" means any disease which may be transmitted from one person to another and declared as such by the State Government by notification;

(47) "inhabited room" means a room in which some person passes the night or which is used as a living room and includes a room with respect. to which there is a reasonable presumption (until the contrary is shown) that some person passes the night therein or that it is used as a living room;

(48) "label" includes any tag, brand, mark or statement in writing on, or attached to, or used in connection with any package containing any article of food or any drug or substance;

(49) "land or building" includes a bustee;

(50) "market" shall be deemed to be synonymous with the expression "bazat and shall mean—

(a) a place where persons assemble for the sale of meat, fish, fruit, vegetables, livestock, or any other article of food of a perishable nature, whether or not there is any collection of shops or warehouses or stalls for the sale of other articles in such place, or

(b) any place of trade, other than a place referred to in sub-clause (a), where there is a collection of shops or warehouses or stalls exceeding such number as the Corporation may specify, declared and licensed by the Corporation as a market;