Wednesday 13 August 2014

Is owning a government plot an unfeasible fantasy nowadays?

Posted by Property Scam at 02:50 | 0 comments

It has now become a near impossibility to own a plot in the city of Bangalore, the BDA has been inactive for more than a decade and the new rules for denotification of land has led to a controversy particularly when it comes to the Arkavathy layout. This has dealt a blow to aspirations of people to own a government plot.

Bangalore has seen a rapid expansion from 226 sq. km to 850 sq. km and the population has increased to 9 million from 5 million in the span of 11 years. The BDA has consistently failed to develop sites like the Arkavathy project when S M Krishna was the chief minister. In fact, many years later another 5 projects were announced but not delivered.

The problem is that lands plots and sites that are free of litigation cannot be identified, the construction activities are not organized, there are many property scams that are predominant, the bureaucratic red tape slows down the process and adds debt to it finally. After 11 years one can say that the BDA has been a failure.

The development of layouts is no longer for the benefit of any citizen, it is a private business for politicians and the very rich. This business begins when the first notification is issued. Today the BDA is viewed with contempt because it lacks both the credibility and the skilled people necessary to ever become a professional body.

In the case of the Arkavathy Layout, the BDA released a notification 11 years earlier. Today that land has shrunk from 3,839.12 acres to 1,766 acres.

An RTI activist BM Shiva Kumar stated that 11 years back they had 70 engineers, today they have only 168 engineers, yet they have failed to complete a single project because it is widely believed that all the Bangalore builders, who are law makers wish to have the BDA closed down. It will be mutually beneficial to them.

Right now middle class citizens cannot afford to purchase land because of the passage of the land availability act which states that BDA owned land must be sold at twice the market value.