Bengaluru: Ahead of court case, BBMP gets statutory boost on building fees

Bengaluru: The state government has amended two laws that will empower the BBMP to levy a set of fees for new and recent construction activities in Bengaluru.

The notification comes two years after the high court quashed various fees charged by the civic body, stating that they were neither part of the BBMP Act nor the Karnataka Municipal Corporations (KMC) Act. The amendment is set to save the civic body Rs 1,712 crore it has already collected as construction-related fees under different heads.

The notification – called the BBMP and Certain Other Law (Amendment) Act 2023 – was published in the Karnataka Gazette on August 16. The Bill was passed in the winter session of the state legislature in December 2023. 

According to the notification, the BBMP is empowered to collect licence fee, fee for maintenance of public roads or storing of construction material, security deposit, commencement certificate free, completion certificate free, scrutiny fee etc.

Although the civic body was collecting these fees from January 2021, it did not have a strong legal backing. 

Hundreds of petitioners including property owners and apartment dwellers approached the high court, challenging the levy of fees under various heads.

In August 2021, the court ruled that the building bye-laws are not enforceable as they are not part of the KMC Act. The order had put the civic body in a spot as it had already collected Rs 1,712 crore and another Rs 688 crore was yet to be collected. 

The matter is coming up for hearing in the high court on Monday. 

Tabling the Bill in the Belagavi session, Deputy Chief Minister D K Shivakumar had said that the government aims to avoid repayment of Rs 2,400 crore to the property owners and builders in the city, collected by the BBMP during the BJP government’s tenure.

He had also promised to reduce the fee after the Leader of the Opposition R Ashoka said the Bill has hiked various fees related to the construction sector. 

Statutory backing

A senior BBMP official said the notification has provided statutory backing to various fees collected by the civic body at the time of any construction activity, be it commencement certificate or regularisation fee.

“Such fees were being collected for several decades. In 2021, the builders started objecting as the fees were linked to guidance value and the difference was huge. There is a proposal to reduce the fee but that may take some time,” he said.