The Jayaprakash Narayan Vichara Vedike has urged the Governor to curtail the State Government's power to allot sites to legislators and Ministers indiscriminately in Bangalore Development Authority (BDA) layouts.
Addressing a press conference here, vedike president B.M. Shivakumar said the BJP had already allotted some 150 sites to former and serving MLAs, MPs, and their family members under the Chief Minister's discretionary quota, called “G” category.
RTI invoked
Citing an example based on documents obtained under RTI Act, he said that Chief Minister B.S. Yeddyurappa in February 2010 allotted a site to his sister B.S. Premamma at H.S.R. Layout, where the market value of the site is over Rs. 2 crore. He also pointed out that Pallavi Ram, daughter of BJP MP D.B. Chandre Gowda, has been allotted a site at RMV 2nd Stage based on her letter in which she had claimed about her “social service” activities and a recommendation by Mr. Chandre Gowda himself.
Structures demolished
Mr. Shivakumar said the site allotted to Ms. Pallavi Ram is the area where the BDA recently demolished structures on the ground that they were erected illegally after it acquired the land even though the landowners insist they had constructed their houses before the acquisition. Another relative of Mr. Yeddyurappa, Surekha Sangappa Bookanakere, has also been allotted a site in May 2010 at Anajanapura Layout. One B.S Shantha Ram has been given a site in H.S.R. Layout but the BDA has not given any information about his designation.
Another site was allotted during February 2010 to M. Sandeep, who has been described as “a project trainee in a private” firm by the BDA in the documents made available to Mr. Shivakumar without giving any other details.
No legal sanction
Mr. Shivakumar said these sites were allotted merely on the basis of a guideline, which has no legal sanction, that stray sites can be allotted to “persons in public life as may be directed by the Government”. Stating that indiscriminate powers to the Chief Minister or to the Government to allot sites is a violation of right of the people who wait for a BDA site for many years, the vedike urged the Governor to ensure that the Government allots sites only to deserving persons who have no site of their own and belong to the economically weaker sections and not to rich elected representatives.
