Bangalore Development Authority to Tie Up With Realty Firms

Bangalore Development Authority (BDA) is planning of entering into agreements with real-estate firms to jointly develop some of the vacant land . An audit, conducted by the authority, revealed that 357 acres of land in 64 residential layouts the BDA has developed over the years are vacant and litigation-free.

These properties do not have any court cases going. We are thinking of constructing apartments on some of this land by partnering with private firms,” B Rajesh Gowda, BDA Commissioner said he would write to the state government for its consent.

EI Technologies — has also identified another 1,169 acres of BDA land that is vacant. “They are currently reviewing the land documents to understand whether there is any litigation. So far, the BDA had notified auctioning of 2,600 sites. The authority has earned around Rs 1,700 crore by selling 1,800 sites. There were seven rounds of auctions.

The board of directors have also decided to float for a global tender for the construction of the 65-km Peripheral Ring Road (PRR) project. The BDA had earlier planned to take up the project through the Swiss Challenge model where different firms would get a chance to offer a better deal than the proposal shared by the first party.

An Israeli firm, called MAZ, had shown interest in building the project by investing around Rs 21,000 crore towards land acquisition and construction. The firm has sought toll collection period for 50 years but the state government wanted the period to be brought down to 30 years.

The Swiss Challenge idea was apparently dropped after it faced strong opposition with some citing the bad experience the state government had in building the NICE corridor around the City through a similar model. “It was decided to float a global tender for the PRR project,” BDA Commissioner confirmed.

The meeting that took place on Monday, one of the longest ones in recent times, was attended by BDA Chairman SR Vishwanath, Urban Development Department Additional Chief Secretary (ACS) Rakesh Singh were present. Other major decisions taken at the meeting were: Construction of a premium township in Konadasapura, approval granted to the annual budget of BDA of Rs 2,252 crore and others.