A HERCULEAN TASK

A HERCULEAN TASK
Ambiguities and several gaps in building regularisation scheme, approved and notified by the government, could delay the entire process
S Kushala & Prathima Nandakumar | TNN

Bangalore: The much-delayed building regularisation scheme, approved and notified by the government, has no doubt brought relief to violators. But several ambiguities on vital issues remain to be sorted out.
For instance: What will be the fate of buildings with more than 50% deviation? Will they continue to languish with the ‘violations’ tag? Or, for that matter how many buildings in Greater Bangalore limits have violated norms? Has the BBMP mapped the violations? How will it ascertain if the declaration on the extent of violation, mandatory according to Karnataka Town and Country Planning (Regularisation of Unauthorised Development or Constructions) Rules 2007, is correct?
The government has come up with different slabs for eight categories of violations — illegal layouts, violations in the formation of sites, setback and FAR violations, buildings without the approved plan, etc. for residential and commercial usage. Residential buildings with violations up to 50% and commercial buildings with violations up to 25% will be regularised. Penalty ranges from Rs 100/sqmt to Rs 600/sqmt depending on the size of the area and the plot/building.
With new regularisation rules in place, the BBMP now fears a deluge of applications. A rough estimate puts the number of properties in Greater Bangalore at 18 lakhs.
As BBMP officials suspect at least 50% of them have violations, the number of properties that need to be regularised stands at a staggering 9 lakhs.
“Logistics is a challenge as the bulk of applications need to be processed and verified. It is a daunting task, especially since the new rules have gaps and ambiguities. However, it is the local bodies which have to do the planning,’’ say town planning officials.
BBMP’s own experience in mapping violations is an indicator. The first and last time the BBMP carried out a survey of violations was when the Karnataka High Court ordered a survey in Koramangala in September 2005.
The exercise took four engineers over 50 days to survey the 100-odd buildings. This time, the challenge is truly mammoth. While the rule has a provision to constitute a screening committee for every urban local body, which will scrutinise applications, fix impact fee and also verify declarations, the question facing the BBMP is: How will the committee tackle individual cases with multiple violations?
“Identifying properties with violations is a Herculean task as property records are not up to date. Given this, having a qualified engineer or architect certify the declarations will help filter out applications with violations more than the permissible limits,’’ said officials.
“The rule will be
made accessible to people and any objection needs to be filed within 30 days. Once the government makes the final notification, the property owners will get 90 days to apply for regularisation,’’ explained officials. The rules have been published in the urban development department office, MS Building. It can also be accessed on the municipal administration department website: www.municipaladmn.kar.nic.in and click on the notification.
UNANSWERED QUESTIONS
Is the law selective in imposing penalty as the fate of residential buildings with violations above 50% and commercial units above 25% is not yet clear? What solution for citizens affected by ill-effects of building violations in their neighbourhood? (BBMP alone has received 20,000 complaints while hundreds others are pending before courts) Will rules allow applications from properties under litigation? Would it not amount to contempt of court?
MYTH V/S REALITY
Setbacks towards neighbouring buildings are regularised only by consent: Consent is insisted upon in the case of corporation areas only where the violation is beyond a certain limit Regularisation is beneficial: It will largely benefit huge commercial and industrial violations
Basement development will not be regularised: Only specific, earmarked areas for parking are saved and the rest will be regularised
Setback violations to the front are relatively harmless: They will get regularised irrespective of the extent and alter irretrievably the existing building lines
Cut-off date shall be maintained as December 31, 2003: Cut-off date cannot be maintained as there are no records for the completion of either illegal developments or illegal change of land use
SAMPLE VIOLATION
Violation of setback area: For a building on a plot of 30x40 sq ft, the law says the front and rear 5-foot setback, left and right 1 metre. So the ground floor construction should be 780 sq ft. If the building’s construction area is more than this, then the violation percentage is calculated as per the prescribed chart.