Tuesday, December 23, 2014

Officials tinker with layout as landowners protest


C Shivakumar
Chennai:

In what could be a blatant violation by officials of CMDA and Thiruverkadu
Municipality, a layout was officially tinkered to help a developer
construct plots while earmarking legally obtained property as public
road.

The issue pertains to 2.4 acres of land situated at 64 Ayanambakkam
Village in Ambattur taluk in Thiruvallur district owned by owners
Kamala Rajaram, Sivakami, Parvathy and Hemamalini. The owners had
entered into a development agreement with Sterling Estates and
Properties located in GN Chetty Road to develop the land and construct
residential units in accordance with CMDA’s norms and parameters.

One of the owners said that the developer company constructed 58 units
of residential houses of which the developer’s share of units have
already been sold. When the builder handed over remaining units to the
owners, it was found that 63 cents) of the whole site (2.04 acres) was
only approved by the CMDA in 2009. The toad area of 664 square metres
was gifted and handed over to local body of Thiruverkadu Municipality
November 2009 and made public.

The owners alleged that the constructions were completed in the entire
areas without layout approval. “A big grill gate was erected as
against the law since the road was made public. The intersect roads
are not gifted to local body but are in absolute possession and
enjoyment of land owners and hence the buyers have no access to their
plots,” said Devarajan, a retired Income Tax officer whose wife is one
of the owners.

It is alleged that commissioner of Thiruverkadu municipality
fraudulently granted the approval by bending the rules knowing fully
well that the proposal was returned unapproved besides the
Thiruverkadu municipality has no delegated powers to grant such
approval as per Development Regulations.

“The fraudulent layout granted by the municipality has no
accessibility and the buyers have no access to pathways leading to
their plots,” the owners stated.

Interestingly, the municipality officials showed the property of
Kamala Rajaram and others as existing roads. The owners said the
member secretary of CMDA as well as commissioner of Thiruverkadu
municipality know very well that without the pathways being gifted the
developer cannot get approval for construction  of residential units.

Surprisingly, even the Electricity Board has effected domestic
connections to the plots without calling for or neither verifying the
layouts as well as status of the roads. The EB cables are running
through the property without obtaining no objection certificate from
the owners. Why was the for area engineer of state electricity board
to effect all domestics connections in a single day without examining
basic compliance, the owners stated.

Even Ambattur sub registrar office failed to follow the rules for
registering a plot in the layout and did not verify chitta or patta.
“The developer, CMDA, Thiruverkadu municipality, electricity board and
sub registrar office in Ambattur criminally conspired together and
fabricated the record showing our property as public road by forging
the documents,” alleged an owner of the land.

Interestingly, when it was brought to the notice of the government, a
probe was ordered and CMDA was asked to give a report on violation
besides regional director of municipal administration was asked to fix
responsibilities on those responsible for the goof-up. Interestingly,
CMDA officials told Express that they have asked for all connected
records from Thiruverkadu Municipality along with remarks. But the
irony is that the municipality has yet to submit the report. “The
approval fraudulently given by the local body is yet to be cancelled,”
a owner said.

Interestingly, this might be the tip of the iceberg as it is believed
CMDA has unearthed many such fake layouts. “During the review we have
found out prima-facie some of the layouts had some issues,” the
official said

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