The Hindu : Tamil Nadu / Chennai News : Where boom spells doom

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, Jun 17, 2006

Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu - Chennai

Where boom spells doom

There are several instances of real estate sharks on the prowl to grab every inch of available space The seamy side of the real estate boom is showing up in the southern suburbs, says K. Manikandan

Behind the tales of real estate development in the southern suburbs and land prices skyrocketing by the day, lie numerous instances of harassment of innocent and unsuspecting people who invest their hard earned money on a small piece of land.

There have been several cases of real estate sharks on the prowl to grab every inch of available space that belongs to the public and the government. Some disturbing incidents in Tambaram involving real estate barons and land brokers make residents wonder if this section was trying to get a stranglehold over public and private property.

Be it the attack on hapless residents who refused to toe the line of miscreants posing as land brokers or the attempts made by a prominent builder to take over nearly two acres of land belonging to the public, the ulterior motive has been to take over land through coercion or make some quick money by making the residents pay by force.

The number of people visiting the offices of senior officials of the city police with complaints of being duped in real estate deals is only a pointer to this menace.

A small section of activists who have been raising their voice against the menace of such land brokers point out that the pressure for space and water has forced people to search for land in the southern fringes of the city. And with land prices rising steeply, people are desperate to buy a plot before it becomes unaffordable. And exploiting their desperation, some land brokers who specialise in settling dubious deals, cheat innocent people.

There are so many fly-by-night operators who manage to attract potential buyers of land and make them pay an initial advance or a deposit amount. Even as the buyers shuttle between government offices and the banks in order to get a loan, the promoters vanish.

Political clout

It is not uncommon to see groups of people flocking to police stations almost every day over land disputes. Some of the complaints pertain to ownership of land and others over the dealings in money transaction in land deals. Sadly, the police, who are not required to interfere in civil cases play the role of a peacemaker and `broker' the deal amicably, activists said.

The clout that real estate barons and land brokers, most of them who have political backing, wield in police stations is a matter of regret, they said.

Police said criticism was often levelled against their department for meddling in cases over which they had no jurisdiction.

But they explained that when two aggrieved parties come to the police station, they could not send them back without doing anything.

A police inspector in the suburbs said they intervened only when it was necessary and that too if they sensed that the dispute was likely to escalate into a law and order problem.

The problems are rooted in many factors — very little government overseeing and regulation, lack of awareness among people who buy property and poorly-trained people becoming land brokers.

Activists too said the need of the hour was to bring land mediators under the scanner of government regulation and subsequently granting them recognition to boost the confidence of people looking to invest in land. Land brokers, who prefer being called mediators, said it was not fair to blame all the people in the trade for the problems.

The problems were caused by those who were not part of the trade. A mediator said as progress in this business was dependant on `word-of-mouth' publicity alone, they were very careful about maintaining their reputation.

And getting people into dubious deals would only harm their business, they contended.

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