The Bengaluru Development Authority (BDA) whose primary duty is to propel the city towards holistic growth, is now falling prey to realtors, wheeler dealers and land sharks as the many scams that have rocked it over the years testify.
It has been accused of de-notifying acquired land to favour individuals for a price, allotting ‘G’ category sites to undeserving individuals and “re-doing” layouts to exempt certain plots from acquisition especially in the Arkavathy Layout, where 20,000 sites were once promised to Bengalureans.
Of late the agency has been embroiled in an alternative site scam, which has allegedly allowed an individual to amass over a 100 sites in benami. The scam has rocked the legislative assembly for the last couple of days with opposition leader, Jagadish Shettar, alleging that a former corporator, Hanumanthe Gowda of Harohalli has been able to corner a large number of “ alternative sites” by bending the rules and using his influence.
In the process both the BDA and rightful allottees have suffered, he told the House. The government has since ordered an inquiry into the matter and promised to recover the sites illegally cornered by individuals.
A Right To Information (RTI) activist believes it is possible for a public representative to get away with such a scam as he could easily gain access to documents and plans of the BDA on a new layout or an approach road to an already formed layout.
“All he has to do is approach farmers or landowners with the plans and warn them about the possibility of their land being acquired , even before the preliminary notification is issued, and offer to buy it himself so they don’t have to accept the paltry compensation given by the government.
He then gets the land registered in a supporter’s name, and then connives with BDA legal section to claim an alternative site in a prime locality when the notification is finally issued and he can play his game,” explained the activist.
Alternative sites are usually given to allottees, who are sometimes “erroneously” given non-existent sites or sites meant for roads/public spaces. Such blunders of the BDA come as a blessing for those eyeing prime alternative sites, say insiders.
Also, the option of taking compensation in the form of 40 per cent of the developed land given to property owners giving up their land for a BDA project, often comes in handy for those eyeing sites in prominent locations.
“While most landowners get peanuts or a couple of lakhs above the guidance value for their properties that are acquired, others, who are adept at cheating the BDA, flourish and make a quick buck by making use of all the avenues available,” said the activist.
Where is BDA headed, towards bankruptcy?
The BDA, which was once a cash cow, is now on the verge of bankruptcy, having little money left for acquiring land to form layouts and providing housing to the people of Bengaluru.
Between 1995 and 2,000, its hey day, the then Chief Minister and Commissioner worked wonders for the BDA, which not only had money for its own layouts but for various other infrastructure projects too.
The Arkavathy Layout was planned at this time to allot 20,000 sites to the people of Bengaluru and a number of flyovers were built by the BDA across the city. But today the civic agency has little money to execute the Peripheral Ring Road (PRR), which has been put into cold storage for years as a result.
The authority has also become mired in various scams with corruption in its ranks failing to go away. Said an RTI activist, “A visit to the BDA will prove the kind of clout touts still enjoy in its corridors as they are found freely wandering around them although the Lokayukta had prohibited their entry into the agency after a raid in which both officials and touts were trapped for corrupt practices."
Secretary of the Citizens’ Action Forum (CAF), Mahalakshmi Parthasarathy underlines the need to bring in transparency in the way the BDA works for the sake of the people it is supposed to serve.
“It is time for the BDA and city in-charge minister, K. J. George to rectify things and make the agency a service-oriented institution like it was supposed to be,” she stressed.
For a long time, as the city’s economy boomed, real estate became the preferred game in town of scamsters, a group that has consisted of realtors, politicians and bureaucrats. And the Bengaluru Development Authority has been a welcoming home to them, and to every big scam in the last decade – denotification, redo, alternate sites, G-category sites, and more. Will this ever change, asks Chandrasekhar G.
