Plot conversion from leasehold to freehold torments Pak refugee families

Thousands of Pakistan refugee families in the city who got plots from the Central government as compensation are struggling to get their properties converted from leasehold to freehold – a process which involves excessive documentation and alleged corruption.

“No one in the city can get a leasehold plot converted to freehold without paying bribes or pulling down the entire building to remove the deviations from the approved building plan,” said Surinder Bhandari, a resident of Malviya Nagar.

Ashok Kumar, a resident of Amar Colony, said: “For a 84 square metre plot owner, the conversion involves payment of about Rs 2-3 lakh through a consultant or ‘agent’.”

“The official fee is about Rs 50,000,” he said,  adding the worst part is that you have to pay penalty for extra construction in the building, get many of these demolished and
still pay bribes because pulling down the entire building is impossible for the occupants.
Why can’t the central government’s Urban Development Ministry convert all leasehold properties into

freehold through an executive order and collect a fixed token conversion fee depending on the size of plots? he asked them.

Kumar, who runs a shop in Sarojini Nagar, said a bulk of refugee plots are up to 100 sq metre and these should be spared any conversion charge.

“For plots between 100-150 sq metre the fee could be Rs 50,000. For plots between150-200 sq metre the conversion fee could be Rs 1 lakh,” he said, adding that it would reduce corruption.  

“The 99-year lease is irrelevant now. Rather than individual plot owners going to the government for conversion from leasehold and freehold, the government should make all leasehold as freehold in a single order and collect a token fee from them,” he said.

Way of accomodation

Former MP and BJP leader V K Malhotra, who had prepared a report for MCD earlier suggesting ways to accommodate the deviations or illegal constructions existing in such colonies, admits that the terms of conversion could be made more user-friendly.

“May be the building-bylaws can be relaxed so that the existing buildings – with additions to the approved plan – can be converted from leasehold to freehold without demolitions,” he told Deccan Herald.

Malhotra’s report in the early 2000s was aimed at collecting a nominal fee from residents of such colonies and allowing them to use the unapproved portions of the house for meeting the needs of the growing family.

He said to bring relief to residents he would discuss the matter with his party’s central government ministers for converting all leasehold properties to freehold through an executive order.

The Pakistan refugees who initially spent a few years in camps like in the Old Fort were allotted plots on 99 year-lease and relocated from camps to 46 refugee colonies developed across the city. Lajpat Nagar, Tilak Nagar, Malviya Nagar, Mukherjee Nagar, Malkaganj, Dayanand Colony, Amar Colony, Ramesh Nagar, Patel Nagar, Subhash Nagar, Jungpura and Rajender Nagar are some of the prominent ones.

The 99-year lease of all houses in refugee colonies has been issued by the  Land and
Development Office based in Nirman Bhawan office of the Ministry.

Preeti Dutta, a resident of Malkaganj in North Delhi, said due to impractical terms her mother-in-law has given up on conversion of their plot with two-storey structure from leasehold to freehold before distributing the property’s different floors among her children.

 “How can families living in a house demolish their entire building before applying for the conversion?” she said.

No plot given out to refugee colonies in the mid-1950s is without some deviations in construction from the sanctioned building plans. “Families have grown over the decades and extra rooms have been built by almost all plot owners. Now, when plot owners want to distribute individual floors to their children, the leasehold comes in way,” she said.

Only wealthy builders are able to get leasehold plots converted to freehold and rebuild the entire property and, in the process, the poor plot owners end up losing money or one floor in the property, she alleged.