Muda set to auction 200 premium sites worth Rs 400 crore

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Mysuru Urban Development Authority (Muda) is expecting to raise Rs 400 crore by auctioning off 200 premium sites and houses within its jurisdiction, thereby covering almost half of its total budgetary allocation of Rs 853 crore. While the move will help generate funds for Muda, it has drawn flak from some quarters.

Adish Sagar from Mysore Realtors’ Association said since the urban development body was unsuccessful in creating new layouts, it started selling off its premium sites in layouts it had developed earlier. This has now turned out to be the primary source of revenue for Muda, he said.

Defending the Muda strategy, chairman of the urban body, HV Rajeev, said after allotment of sites to private players, some buyers either failed to pay or they failed to meet the criteria set by Muda for distribution of the sites, which led to cancellation of allotments. These cancelled allotments were being redistributed by the govt, but the process was stopped following a court intervention, Rajeev further explained.

“Since then, such sites are being auctioned off. Sites that were priced at just Rs 8,000 decades back are today selling for Rs 1 crore,” he further said. Muda commissioner GT Dinesh Kumar told these sites, reserved for raising capital to fund future Muda projects, have now turned out to be a prime source of revenue for the civic authority. He said: “We have listed some 200 sites, all intermediate, in various layouts across Mysuru for auctioning. We’re verifying whether these sites have been allotted to anyone else before putting them up for auction.”

He added: “Once the sub-registrar’s office provides encumbrance certificates, the process will start. We believe there won’t be any issue even if elections are declared, but would still seek clarification.”

Muda is now pressing for the Basavanahalli group housing scheme where multi-level houses would be built and distributed to aspirants. “We’re awaiting approval from the urban development department,” the commissioner added.

Further justifying the Muda policy, Rajeev said: “There is no land for development of new layouts. Even joint ventures and site-sharing have been hit because of non-availability of large chunks of land, while private developers have blocked lands by paying heavily to the landlords.”Given such a situation Muda is left with no option but to auction off sites that are still with them, Rajeev reasoned.

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