The government is working on a scheme to regularise revenue sites with minimum deviations across all major urban centres. This, elected representatives suggest, may lead to a two-fold gain: An increase in revenue, since owners of these sites would have to pay betterment fees and other charges, and political dividends, especially with Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) polls around the corner.
Chief minister Basavaraj Bommai has held several rounds of talks with state urban department, rural development and panchayat raj, and BBMP officials regarding a scheme to regularise B khata sites in major municipal corporations.
“If all goes to plan, the CM may announce the proposal in the budget on March 4,” said a senior official of the state urban development department.
The idea isn’t new. The Karnataka Administrative Reforms Commission-2 (KARC-2), headed by former chief secretary TM Vijay Bhaskar, recently recommended conversion of B khata sites to A khata ones by collecting a land conversion fee, a fine, and a compounding fee to the planning authority concerned.
It suggested issuing suitable rules under Section 76F of the Karnataka Town and Country Planning (KTCP) Act. It also recommended that the government consider legalising revenue sites (11B) on the outskirts of cities that fall under the gramathana or RDPR department.
There are about six lakh B khata sites in Bengaluru alone and the plan envisages regularising only the sites or plots and keep building deviations out of its ambit so that the Supreme Court’s directions on Akrama Sakrama are not flouted. There will be no scope to regulate building violations. A development fee of Rs 200-300 per square metre in central parts of the city and Rs 250-300 in outer zones could be levied. The government hopes to earn around Rs 5,000 crore, including Rs 2,500 crore by regularising B khata sites across urban centres.
While elected representatives say the scheme could be a win-win, some experts point out several such proposals have been gathering dust since 2010.
Cyriac Joseph, senior vice-president and head of marketing, Vaishnavi Group, said converting khatas from B to A will benefit property owners and civic bodies.
“The process of regularisation itself will help owners avail many benefits including home loans, which was otherwise a challenge,” Joseph said. From a BBMP perspective, he said it will help create a more transparent system and bring more sites under the property tax umbrella.
However, Joseph said the scheme should ideally be a onetime exercise with a clearly defined window for regularisation. “Also, the policy should be unambiguous on how such properties would be treated in future,” he said. Suresh Hari, chairman, CREDAI, Bengaluru, said the move will lead to more proper plan sanction and foolproof taxing system.
