Written by: Express News Service
2 min readChandigarhMar 28, 2009 12:46 AM IST
First published on: Mar 28, 2009 at 12:46 AM IST
Previous allottee maintains ownership
Acting on the directions of the Punjab and Haryana High Court,the UT Estate Office on Friday placed a single commercial site in Sector 32 under the hammer. The two-bay showroom site,which was the subject matter of a recently disposed petition,could not fetch even a penny more than the reserve price of Rs 3.5 crore. The same person who was a party to the case maintained ownership of the site.
The auction of 106 residential and commercial sites was postponed at the last minute,after the Election Commission of India denied permission to the Estate Office,with the model code of conduct for the Lok Sabha elections in place.
Bhupinder Singh,a resident of Phase III,Mohali,bought the site at its reserve price of Rs 3.5 crore,fixed by the High Court. According to officials,Singh was allotted the same site in an earlier auction. “He had taken loan from a bank and was to repay it in instalments. But since he defaulted on the payment,the case went to court,” said an official.
Assistant Estate Officer Ashwani Kumar refused to divulge any details of the auction and said: “The proceedings have been recorded and will be sent to the High Court.”
An advertisement was published in newspapers for the auction of the site — shop-cum-office (SCO) number 61 in Sector 32 with an area of 126 square yards (1,134 square feet). Despite the presence of 12-odd interested parties at the venue,none bid for the site,barring Singh,who eventually got the site once again.
According to information,the Estate Office has asked Singh to pay the extension fee,besides making the balance payment running into several lakhs of rupees.
In the previous auction held in October 2008,only six commercial sites — three SCOs and three booths — could be auctioned. An SCO in Sector 32 had fetched the highest price of Rs 4.75 crore while the minimum price fetched by any site was Rs 4.33 crore against a reserve price of Rs 1.85 crore.
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