Chintels Seeks Nod to Raze Paradiso Tower J

GURUGRAM: Chintels India has asked the Deputy Commissioner for written permission to demolish Tower J at Paradiso in Sector 109, another structure earlier declared unsafe in the project where five of nine towers have already been brought down.

In a letter dated 14 September, the developer sought approval to start demolition, asked for a government team to supervise the work, and said Edifice Engineering had been contracted for the job. The letter was also marked to the director of town and country planning, the additional deputy commissioner and the district town planner (enforcement).

Why Tower J is on the list

Tower J was declared unsafe for habitation after a structural assessment by IIT Delhi. A district administration order in August 2024, based on a joint committee report and the IIT findings, directed residents to vacate. The assessment flagged a high risk of reinforcement corrosion linked to chlorides in the concrete, reduced alkalinity and deterioration, and warned that corrosion could accelerate even without visible distress.

The administration concluded that repair and rehabilitation were not feasible because of the chloride load. Residents were told to vacate and hand possession to Chintels. The latest request follows the Supreme Court's early September directions on unsafe towers and redevelopment at Paradiso. Occupants of unsafe flats have been asked to vacate and hand over possession by 1 January 2027.

The project originally had nine towers in two phases. Towers D, E, F, G and H in Phase I have already been demolished, leaving A, B, C and J in Phase II. Under the approved arrangement described in court-linked briefings, owners of flats in the four remaining towers are to receive redeveloped apartments on the existing Phase II land. The court process has also noted that dozens of occupants were still living in structures declared unsafe.

Chintels said in the September letter that demolishing Tower J was necessary to comply with the Supreme Court directions and sought approval at the earliest. The February 2022 vertical collapse of living rooms in one of the towers, which killed two residents, remains the grim backdrop to every later structural order on the site.

For remaining occupants, the practical clock is the 1 January 2027 vacation deadline and the separate question of when the district administration issues a written demolition nod. Until that permission is granted and a supervised schedule is published, Tower J stays in the uneasy category of a declared-unsafe building awaiting formal razing. Officials dealing with enforcement have previously been authorised to take police help if possession handovers stall.