TN Board creating problems in redevelopment

Chennai

The trend of re-developing old TNHB apartments is growing but the exercise is riddled with hurdles, mostly caused by the original promoter — the Tamil Nadu Housing Board.

The TNHB has been accused of being reluctant to grant owners a no-objection certificate for redevelopment. Till 2000, it issued sale deeds without properly conveying the rights over the undivided share of land (UDS) to owners. In effect, the buyers own only the footprint of the complexes and have no ownership rights over the thoroughfare, car park and surrounding play area. The Board never even obtained a patta from revenue department while originally developing the land. So, now the owners of TNHB flats don’t own a patta, which is necessary for redevelopment.

For re-development, the CMDA insists on owners/builders obtaining orientation sketch and NOC from the TNHB and patta from tehsildar. The applicant, who has to produce orientation sketch before revenue officials for patta, first pays 10% of the land’s guideline value (running into several lakhs in most cases) for the sketch and NOC. “The Board recovered the entire cost of the project — land cost, development charges, cost of construction and overheads — from the buyers at the time of sale, so there is no justification in demanding more money from the owners. The CMDA should approve projects without insisting on an NOC,” said P V Shanmugam, MD, Kgeyes, who has re-developed 12 TNHB projects.

The TNHB in the past had filled water bodies and promoted projects over them without reclassifying it as residential land. “It is now left to the apartment owners to get it reclassified,” said Shanmugam.

S Sankararaman, whose apartment in Tiruvanmiyur is being re-developed, says the project, started in May 2008, got delayed because of the TNHB and CMDA delaying NOC and approval. “I am very happy about the new building. But I had to wait for a long time,” he said.

D P Yadav, MD of TNHB, said: “It is the Board’s decision to insist on NOC and collect money in cases where the UDS is not conveyed.” The same Board had decided in August 2009 to do away with issuing NOC for re-development of its apartment complexes. The decision was retracted recently. V Jaggannathan, MD of Ramaniyam, said, “Going by the Housing Board’s logic, if footprints of the apartment complexes alone have been sold to owners, nobody can enter their house without trespassing Board’s land. We have no other option than approaching the court for remedy,” he added.

Check List

All owners should have obtained sale deeds from TNHB Owners should jointly apply for the orientation sketch from the TNHB Owners should jointly apply for patta at taluk office Negotiate collectively with builders who have a good track record Ask the builder to fix the selling price for his share, compare it with other nearby projects As the selling price goes up, land owners’ share also goes up Make the builder specify time required for completing the project