The Hindu : Karnataka / Bangalore News : They live in constant fear of land acquisition by BDA

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Tuesday, Jul 15, 2008
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Karnataka

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They live in constant fear of land acquisition by BDA

Staff Reporter

Residents of Nandini Layout seek regularisation of revenue sites

BDA notified land for acquisition in Nandini Layout in 1977
The authority has fenced 14 of the 29 vacant sites in the area

Bangalore: As many as 6,000 revenue site owners of Nandini Layout, whose land was notified by the Bangalore Development Authority (BDA) for acquisition in 1977, are living under the constant fear of losing our their property to the BDA.

The BDA has fenced 14 of the 29 vacant sites in the area. This has upset residents who have constructed small houses on similar sites, the area MLA N.L. Narendra Babu said on Monday.

Addressing presspersons, the MLA alleged that the BDA was unnecessarily creating problems for the owners of the revenue sites. “As per rules, the BDA should have formed a layout within five years of notifying a particular area. If they don’t, the notification becomes invalid. It is ridiculous that the officials have suddenly realised that the land is theirs,” he said.

Though the sites in Nandini Layout originally belonged to the BDA, the organisation handed them over to the Bruhat Bangalore Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) in 1990. Subsequently, the BBMP collected betterment charges and all other tax from the owners including property tax and issued khatas. Most residents, who could not afford to construct their houses earlier, were now planning to construct after applying for bank loans. “We have taken a home loan from a nationalised bank. After the BBMP sanctioned the building plan for us, we demolished the old asbestos-roofed house to construct a new building. But before we could do anything, BDA officials came and fenced our property,” K.M. Chandrashekar, a constable working as a clerk in the Bangalore District office of the Police Department, said.

Mr. Chandrashekar, who lost his brother in the 1991 Cauvery riots and later his father, said he was helpless now. “I spent my whole life in marrying off my three sisters and now when things were stabilising, the BDA has taken away my property,” he said. Rama B., Malini Nayak, Devaraj and K. Radhakrishna — some of the affected residents — poured out their woes at the press conference.

Fight for justice

Mr. Babu said all the 3.26 lakh revenue site owners in the city had come together to form the Bangalore City Revenue Site Owners’ Protection and Action Forum and fight for justice. “We want the Government to denotify the land and regularise the sites. The owners are ready to pay all the prescribed fees to the BDA, which would anyway resell the sites to other buyers,” he said. The residents, who had already submitted memoranda to Chief Minister B.S. Yeddyurappa and BDA Commissioner H. Siddaiah, would launch a stir if their demands were not met, he added.

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