Urban News

Indian Express 08.12.2009

750 wadas in bad shape, only 33 in for revamp

In June this year, the state Urban Development Department issued directions to the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) to give permission within 48 hours to wada tenants who want to carry out repair work and have applied for it. The directives were issued after a civic survey highlighted the dilapidated condition of 1,600 wadas. On its part, the PMC had issued notices to around 750 wada owners asking them to pull down the structures.

However, the PMC received only 33 applications for repairing the wadas in last six months. Reason: Most of the wada owners refused to co-operate with tenants who want to carry out the repairs. The wada owners instead want tenants to vacate the place, civic officials said.

There are a number of peth localities in the city, including Kasba Peth, Somwar Peth, Raviwar Peth and Nana Peth, housing about 10,000 wadas. As per the decision, wada tenants can forward an application for repair work to ward offices and permission for it has been promised within 48 hours, provided the necessary paperwork is in place. However, the tenants are not allowed to make structural changes.

An official from civic structural engineering section said, “We had expected more applications in the initial year. From Bhavani Peth, Kasba Peth and Vishrambaugwada areas, that house old wadas on a large-scale, we received 13 applications from tenants. From the Sahakarnagar area, 20 applications were received.”

He said, “Of 33 applications, we gave permission to carry out the repair work only to 14 tenants, as others did not furnish the necessary documents.” He said the low turnout is due to various reasons, the prominent being the differences between wada owners and tenants.

MLA Girish Bapat said, “The response of the wada tenants has been very cold. There are problems in its implementation. For example, if a tenant from the third floor wants to carry out a repair work, he needed to get consent from other wada members who might refuse. Secondly, the differences between the wada owners and tenants always remain. Thirdly, tenants are allowed only to make structural changes and not to increase the area of the wada, which is why tenants want to stay away from it.” Bapat called for an appointment of a special authority like that for slum rehabilitation.

Additional Commissioner Umakant Dangat said, “In most cases, wada owners do not share documents of the property with their tenants. Hence, the problem.”

The Hindu 08.12.2009

Property guidance values hiked

Sharath S. Srivatsa

Bangalore, Dec 7

The recession–hit real estate sector may be taking its time to recover but the Government has been making an upward revision of guidance value of property across the State.

Beginning April 1 this year, it had effected the revision in nine districts and the Revenue Department is expected to complete the revision in at least 10 more districts by March 2010.

While the value of property have been revised in Shimoga, Hassan, Bidar, Haveri, Koppal, Davangere, Mysore, Gulbarga and Chitradurga districts, new values are to be given in Chickaballapur, Chikmagalur and Kolar districts in December following approval from the Central Valuation Committee. “The exercise to revise guidance value across Karnataka had been taken up since April this year, as it had been pending for the last three years. We do not foresee any drastic drop in property transactions due to this upward revision,” the Inspector-General of Registration and Commissioner of Stamps, Mr K.R. Niranjan, said.

Asked if the revision was to increase revenue collection as the Department had seen a shortfall of over 20 per cent, Mr Niranjan said: “Only 30 per cent of the total revenue collections in the State come from the districts; the rest from Bangalore urban and rural districts due to high value of property.

“The upward revision in districts would not make a big impact on revenue collections.”

Compensation

The revision ranges from as low as 5 per cent in Hassan and Honnali to a high of 401 per cent in Banavara in Hassan district. The value of property in some places such as Harapanahalli and Jagalur in Davangere district has not been touched.

According to a Revenue Department official, despite the recession, the upward revision has been effected after demand came from the public. In many places where public are expected to lose their property for development purposes and acquisition process for industrial development, such a revision would help them get a higher compensation, the official said.

In fact, the official pointed out that the Department did not receive any objection when the guidance value was revised, and the number of registrations has not come down in places where the revision has been implemented already.

Dubai crisis fallout

The decision on the revision of guidance value for property in and around Bangalore would be taken only after March 2010, and factors such as revenue collection performance and recession effect would be considered before taking such decision, said Mr. Niranjan. “If it [revision] takes place whether it would be an upward or a downward revision depends on many factors.”

The debt crisis in far off Dubai is expected to cast a shadow on the coastal belt in Karnataka, especially in respect to registration of property. “Most of the property investments in coastal Karnataka are by the expat population. With the crisis in Dubai expected to spill over to other west Asian countries, we expect a hit to our revenue collections,” a senior Revenue Department official said.

He added that places such as Mangalore, Udupi, Kundapura, Bhatkal and Karwar could be affected.