BENGALURU: Want to check if your property is situated on a Storm Water Drain (SWD)? Help is now at your fingertips!
The Real Estate Research Initiative of the Indian Institute of Management Bangalore (IIMB-RERI), with support from the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP), has launched a web-based portal ( www.rajakaluve.org ) which would help citizens know if their property is situated on a SWD. This is among their first such public service initiatives to empower citizens.
“To make use of this portal, citizens would need to have the village, hobli, taluk and survey number on which the property is situated,” said N. Karthik, Manager at IIMB-RERI.
Explaining how the project was conceived, Venkatesh Panchapagesan, Head, IIMB-RERI and faculty of IIMB said that the idea was triggered when the civic body started clearing encroachments on SWD. “Our interest turned into a concrete project after we found that even the tech-savvy IIMB faculty had trouble manoeuvering through government websites for information.”
Prof. Panchapagesan said that through the project, they aimed to collate the information available in the public domain. “We attach all the original documents and maps along with the search so that users can check for themselves too. At present, one can search at the survey number level since the property level information is yet to be made public. Users may still need to reach out to the government for information or get legal guidance if they have a doubt,” he added.
For the initiative, IIMB-RERI is collaborating with a citizen initiative, www.mapshalli.org , to provide a Google map based search capability. While www.mapshalli.org had initially mapped 50 villages around Whitefield, they have expanded to 350 villages after tying up with IIMB.
BBMP Commissioner N. Manjunath Prasad said that the software has taken into consideration information from two sources — the Revenue Department and the BBMP. The website www.rajakaluve.org is optimised for mobile viewing and searches can be done in Kannada too.
