If you violate building norms in Bengaluru, the ground floor will belong to the state
Taking a cue from the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation, Bengaluru’s Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) has proposed to amend bylaws enabling it to take ownership of the ground floors of buildings, which do not stick to its sanctioned plans.
This proposal has been mentioned in the 2017-18 BBMP Budget which was released on Saturday.
Atul Chaturvedi for the Bangalore Mirror reported that the rule will be applicable for every building which is more than five storeys in the city.
BBMP officials told BM that more than half of properties altered from its approved structure at the time of issuing occupancy certificates.
“Deviations are one of the biggest headaches after building plans are sanctioned. Genuine buyers are also affected by this problem. Henceforth, when builders come to BBMP to get their construction plan approved, they will have to register the ground floor in BBMP’s name. Once the construction is completed and at the time of issuance of the occupancy certificate, the ground floor will be released to the builder or developer,” BBMP Commissioner N Manjunath Prasad told BM.
Rohith BR for The Times of India reported that the ground floor of the building will be registered to the civic body at a fee of Rs 100 and the ownership will be transferred to the builder only after occupation certificates have been released.
"If the property owner has violated the building plan, the ground floor ownership will remain with the BBMP,” MK Gunashekar, Chairman of the Standing Committee on Finance And Taxation, BBMP was quoted as saying in TOI.
The proposal is aimed at curbing violations as well as potential safety hazards, officials said.
"During 2016, there were many building collapses including a major one in Bellandur. We found that building norms violations were rampant. To arrest such illegal constructions, we proposed an amendment to the building bylaws by linking building plan approvals to issuance of occupancy certificate. Since occupancy certificate is crucial for renting or leasing out any property , we want to ensure that such a certificate is obtained only after the building is built as per the plan," an official of BBMP’s planning wing told TOI.