It’s daylight robbery; BDA, withdraw penalty

The Bengaluru Development Authority’s (BDA) decision to steeply increase penalty on site allottees who have failed to construct houses within the stipulated three-year period is condemnable and should be withdrawn immediately. In some slabs, the hike is as much as 150%. In many cases, owners complain they have not been able to construct houses even after a decade or more since the allotment of sites, as some BDA layouts are unliveable in the absence of even basic facilities like roads, water supply, electricity or sanitary connection. Many allottees who had invested their life’s savings and have even obtained bank loans are in the lurch as they have to pay their monthly EMIs. Instead of imposing an unrealistic penalty on the owners, wherever the layouts are incomplete, the BDA should compensate them for the loss suffered on account of payment of EMI. Nonetheless, the BDA is being extremely unreasonable at a time when people are suffering from job loss and salary cuts due to the pandemic, leading to a situation where many owners may not have the financial wherewithal to begin construction even if the layouts are fully functional. The three-year deadline itself should be put on hold till the economy stabilises.

Also read: Allotment of 33-acre land to BDA staff association is illegal: Karnataka HC

To add insult to injury, BDA has now imposed a maintenance fee in addition to the annual property tax. While this has been withdrawn in the case of Nadaprabhu Kempegowda layout following a public outcry, owners of other layouts are not as lucky. When amenities themselves are absent, the question is, what is the BDA going to maintain with the fees that it is collecting? Levying maintenance fee itself is untenable as the Authority has already collected huge development charges at the time of allotment of sites. Considering that absolutely no infrastructure has been created in some layouts, the BDA should explain where the crores of rupees already collected have disappeared.

The BDA has remained a den of corruption since its inception in 1976 and though every chief minister promises to stem the rot, one scandal after another keeps tumbling out with unfailing regularity. The worst impacted are the common people, who pin their hopes on the Authority and aspire to own a house in Bengaluru where land rates are otherwise unaffordable. Instead of striving to turn their dreams to reality, BDA is known to throw a spanner in the works, as it has done now. Site owners who have already paid through their noses, should not be made to suffer anymore due to the inefficiencies and inadequacies of the authority. Chief Minister B S Yediyurappa should immediately intervene and stop this daylight robbery.