Chandigarh Housing Board: Prime chunk of IT park land to be auctioned sold as freehold

“It would be a first time sale to a developer on freehold basis to construct residential units on this land. The issue will be coming up in the board meeting on March 8,” the officer said. According to the details, as many as 300 flats can be developed on this piece of land.

In 2015, the CHB got 123 acres of land back from the real estate company Parsvnath Developers, after a long-drawn legal battle. In October 2006, the board decided to develop the site with Parsvnath Developers. However, the project could not be launched. Later in 2015, the CHB took the land back after paying over Rs 560 crore. It had then planned to develop a housing colony, five-star hotel, gymnasium, swimming pool, club, community centre and marriage hall on the 123 acres.
Under the Habitat Project planned by the CHB, they proposed to come up with a hospital on 8.23 acres with reserve price of Rs 308 crore, school on 4.5 acres with reserve price of Rs 188 crore and a residential project over five acres. Even a hotel site was auctioned for Rs 300 crore but it did not find any bidders. The board had been making attempts to auction off 18 sites for the project, including a five-star hotel and a hospital, for the last two years. Following this, the board decided to develop these sites on its own and construct around 1,000 flats on two sites. The remaining 18 sites were to be auctioned to private builders. But even after several auctions in the past, no bidder turned up, citing high rates and the fact that the property was on leasehold basis. On leasehold basis, a the person taking the property has no ownership rights.

There were flats that were to be constructed by the CHB for Punjab, Haryana and other government agencies as well on an area spanning 6.43 acres (specifically earmarked for government employees housing scheme). In all, there will be 300 flats constructed by the board under the same project.

UT admin allowed conversion of leasehold to freehold for auction

Due to the poor response in various auctions of the CHB, the administration allowed conversion of properties from leasehold to freehold and gave a nod to give its units on freehold basis.

The approval was given after the administration stated that there was no policy that bars the selling of plots by government agencies as freehold properties.
The response to various auctions of leasehold properties has remained very poor, with no takers.

Ownership rights in leasehold properties remain with government agencies, such as estate office (EO), municipal corporation (MC) and Chandigarh Housing Board (CHB), while freehold status gives the owner complete rights to the property.

The administration was being pressed to allow the sale of vacant and unsold leasehold plots as freehold repeatedly.