A team of officials from the Coonoor Municipality, along with the Revenue Department, served eviction notices on 25 shopkeepers who were running businesses illegally in the municipality’s buildings at Coonoor Bus Stand.
Coonoor Municipality Commissioner R Saraswathi said that the buildings had been leased by one person and the rest of his family, who were paying a small fee as a rent to the municipality, had sub-leased the shops at inflated rates to others.
“Municipality inspectors, revenue department officials and staff had already completed inspection of the shops earlier, and had found that the buildings were being occupied illegally,” said Ms. Saraswathi.
Officials said that norms were flouted for many years, and the person who had originally leased the shops had made crores of rupees in profits from sub-leasing the space to others.
“A public toilet at the bus stand had been sub-leased to an X-ray centre operating in the area, who were using the facility and allowing only their patients to use it,” said an official, stating that the eviction notices served on shopkeepers had instructed them to vacate the space within three days.
Officials added that they were looking into how many of the 893 shops, operating in the municipality's buildings, including ones at the Coonoor Bus Stand and the market, were in violation of municipality rules. They added that the shops bring in only ₹ 1.92 crore a year in revenue to the municipality, stating that efforts were under way to convince the shopkeepers to pay a revised tariff that would bring the municipality total revenues amounting to ₹8 crore a year.
The shops that have been served eviction notices would be put up for auction, said officials.
