The Hindu : New Delhi News : Draw held for DDA flats amid protests

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Aug 13, 2004

New Delhi

New Delhi

Draw held for DDA flats amid protests

By Our Staff Reporter

NEW DELHI, AUG. 12. As many as 2,356 flats were allotted by the Delhi Development Authority today through a computerised draw of lots for its "Two-Bedroom Housing Scheme 2004''. The draw was held at the DDA Headquarters under the supervision of the DDA Vice-Chairman, Madhukar Gupta, in front of a panel of observers and mediapersons.

However, as representatives of the applicants were not invited for the draw, there were strong protests by a large number of people who had come to witness the outcome of a scheme which broke all past records through sale of over 150,000 forms and receipt of 93,775 applications.

Also, as the draw took some time, the 3,000-odd people who had collected at Vikas Sadan grew restless.

Since they did not have any access to the proceedings going on inside the conference room, all kinds of allegations were levelled by them.

At this, DDA allowed some of the applicants to come into the room and witness the proceedings for themselves. But from the conduct of the applicants, it did not appear that they were satisfied with the "transparency'' and "fair play''.

Before the draw, the Principal Commissioner, D.B. Gupta, said the number of flats had been increased from around 1,500 to 2,356 in view of the response.

Of these flats, he said, one per cent or 24 each will be for the physically handicapped, ex-servicemen and war widow categories.

Similarly, 17.5 per cent or 412 units had been kept aside for Scheduled Castes and 7.5 per cent for the Scheduled Tribes. This left a total of 1,696 flats for the general category.

Though in 1979, the NPRS scheme had attracted 171,000 applications, Mr Gupta said that scheme had all kind of flats -- LIG, MIG and Janata -- and did not have completely constructed units.

But this scheme has offered only constructed flats in one category and the response was therefore a record in itself.

Of the flats allotted today, 1,042 were in Dwarka, 480 in Kondli Gharoli, 189 in Madipur, 84 in Mayur Vihar, 302 in Peeragarhi and 257 in Rohini. As they had been priced at between Rs 7.50 lakhs and 14.50 lakhs, the response had been beyond expectation even for DDA officials.

However, despite the number of applications, Mr Gupta said DDA had been able to hold the draw as per the promise in August. And he added that while all the demand letters will be issued by the month-end, the refund of the Rs 50,000 deposit money would be made to all the unsuccessful applicants by September 15.

Through the draw, DDA had also drawn a list of the "waiting category'' which would be offered flats should some of the applicants surrender theirs.

"This category will have 25 per of 2,356 or 589 applicants and so if there are say 50 surrenders then the first 50 from this list will be given the option to apply afresh.'' But all these 25 per cent will be refunded their deposits along with the rest of the unsuccessful applicants.

The draw was held before three judges, who included two senior bureaucrats, Priya Singh and A.K. Singhal, and a Professor from IIT, R.K. Arora.

The judges drew token from five jars through which the random numbers for both the applications and the number of houses were arrived at. These numbers -- 76,840 for applications and 2,300 for residential units -- were then fed into the computer which took about 32 minutes to complete the draw.

Printer friendly page
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

New Delhi