According to a senior urban body official, with a view to spur interest in its land pooling policy, the Delhi Development Authority (DDA) is working on issuing a conditional notice for the formation of a union of landlords this month.
Once a federation comes into existence in a particular area, it will become the responsibility of the union to persuade other landowners in that particular area to pool in their land parcels, so that 70% of the contiguous land reaches the minimum extent And the area becomes eligible to be acquired by the authorities for development works.
Explaining the reason behind this development, a senior DDA official said that through the conditional notice, the urban body now wants to shift the responsibility of achieving minimum 70% proximity through landowners who have already covered their land in the policy. expressed interest. The official said that the process of preparation and issuance of conditional notices will take two weeks.
“Through this, the DDA will facilitate the formation of the consortium. The onus of ensuring the contiguous land will now rest on those who have expressed their interest in the policy. They should ensure proximity to the land by assuring others in their areas who have not yet expressed interest in pooling their land parcels,” the DDA official said.
The development comes two months after Union Housing and Urban Affairs Minister Hardeep Singh Puri announced a two-pronged strategy aimed at accelerating the execution of the land pooling policy.
strategy
One of them was amending the Delhi Development Act, 1957. The proposed amendment sought to make land pooling mandatory after the participation rate in an area reaches a minimum threshold of 70%.
However, the proposed amendments were not introduced in the recent Parliament session, which concluded in April.
The alternative plan was to issue conditional notices to landowners, who have already expressed their interest in the policy, to form a consortium – the scheme which is now being implemented by the DDA.
context
Despite being ambitious on paper, the land pooling policy has been a stalemate in terms of execution, with no development work taking place since it was notified – on two occasions in 2013 and 2018.
At present, 104 villages – which have been divided into six sectors and further divided into sectors – have been identified for land pooling. As per the current policy, 70% of contiguous land is required to be eligible to form a union of landowners in an area.
Although the contiguous factor has acted as a major route with the urban body agreeing that it has achieved 70% participation in many areas, contiguousness is yet to be achieved.
Senior agency officials say the conditional notices will work towards reviving the ultimate interest in the policy.
To give an example of the declining interest in the land pooling policy, take this sample – from January 24 to February 28 – only 19 applications and 12.6 additional hectares of land were registered during the last extension given by the DDA for pooling applications. Since the agency first opened its window for land pooling applications in February 2019, a total area of 7,275.45 hectares has been registered out of a total of 6,922 applications.
As per the current policy, 60% of the land can be used by the owners or the developer unit for the development of residential and commercial facilities. However, 40% of the land should be dedicated to service providing agencies, such as the DDA, for infrastructure development such as road networks, sewerage systems and parks.
Earlier, senior DDA officials, including vice-president Manish Gupta, had insisted that development work would start in at least two of the 16 high priority areas that have been identified in Zones L, N and P-II.
Responding to the progress of the development works, a senior DDA official said that the infrastructure plans have been completed. “We are preparing to move forward, these plans are in respect of P-II and N sectors,” the official said.