After months of uncertainty over the new “single layout” policy, the Mangalore Urban Development Authority (MUDA) has said that it has sent a proposal to the State government to allow those with less than 10 cents of land within corporation limits to construct a house without the need to get approval from the authority.
Deputy Commissioner A.B. Ibrahim said on Saturday that the approval may come through “within a couple of weeks”.
MUDA, of which the DC is the Chairman, has proposed that the Commissioner of Mangalore City Corporation (MCC) can now approve the sketches to build a house on 10 cents or less (commonly called single site approval).
“Before, for marginal holders, they had to first get approval from the MUDA and then again from the MCC. If the proposal is accepted, the process of approval for citizens is bound to get faster,” he said. However, this relaxation does not apply to those who are constructing over existing houses.
The decision was taken after a meeting of the authority on November 8, wherein Minister of State for Fisheries and Youth Affairs K. Abhaychandra Jain said the process of single-site approval from the MUDA was causing a lot of problems in the district where marginal landholdings were common.
Calling the proposal an eye wash before the imminent Lok Sabha elections, G. Hanumanth Kamath, president of the Nagarika Hitarakshana Vedike, said there could not be any changes without the approval of the Cabinet.
“For any change in the master plan of the MUDA , the Cabinet has to approve — just as the BJP-led government had done in 2009, 2010 and 2011. After this, it has to come out as a notification and gazetted. This is a long procedure,” he said.
However, if such the proposal is implemented, he said citizens could save on at least “one month’s time” that the file spends in the MUDA office and high penalty from the MUDA if the land has been found to have been divided.
