G-category sites: Suspect motive

The Karnataka government is set to revive the infamous G-category sites, with the cabinet taking a decision to allot 5% of housing plots developed by the government under the Chief Minister’s discretionary quota. Housing Minister V Somanna has announced that the quota will apply only to sportspersons, ex-military personnel, journalists, winners of state and national awards, lawyers and judges and a couple of other categories, but the indiscriminate manner in which sites were allotted to a favoured few in the past, even as thousands of common people were in the queue, does not inspire any confidence in the government’s assurance. Deplorably, the quota has been used to curry favour with journalists by some Chief Ministers; the inclusion of judges in the category should be seen as an attempt to influence the judiciary. The Supreme Court and the Karnataka High Court should take serious note of this. It would give great confidence to the public if the Chief Justice of India were to declare that no judge would accept such sites. An out-of-turn allotment of sites had snowballed into a major controversy some years ago and judges had come under severe criticism.

In 2010, the High Court held that the government had no right to allot sites following complaints of large-scale irregularities and in 2012, then CM Jagadish Shettar announced abolition of the G-category quota. After a nudge from the court, the government set up the Justice Padmaraj Committee to inquire into the irregularities in the allotment of 640 BDA sites in 2006-2008 in prime areas of Bengaluru, including to legislators, party workers, and even some listed as gardeners and hotel waiters. Not surprisingly, the government rejected the committee’s report and appointed another panel, headed by Justice A M Farooq in 2015. In 2019, the Chief Justice ordered a court-monitored probe headed by Justice D V Shylendra Kumar to scrutinise the allotment of 814 more sites. The committee is yet to submit its report, the main reason for the delay being the failure of the BDA to submit the relevant documents.

The government should do away with G-category, which has been often misused to favour certain sections, particularly politicians, bureaucrats and their relatives. Even in exceptional cases, where the government would like to recognise exemplary contribution to the state or the country, the allotment should be made by an independent committee and not by the Chief Minister. Bringing back the G-category allotments in an election year, despite several adverse remarks by the High Court, raises serious questions and suspicions about the government’s motives.