Check whether your property lies within 75 metres of any lake. If so, you are in trouble. The National Green Tribunal (NGT) passed an order on May 4 increasing the buffer zone around lakes from 30 metres to 75 metres, which comes into effect prospectively. This means that properties built in the 30- to 75- metre zone according to the norms of the day are legal and will not be affected in any way.
However, Town Planning experts say that even these properties will be affected by the NGT order, as they can no longer be redeveloped.
And if you have an empty site in this zone, you cannot initiate construction.
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Thus, while the present building would not be affected, it cannot be demolished and redeveloped.
S.B. Honnur, retired director of Town Planning in the State, said, “This NGT order is disastrous. Thousands of properties in the 30- to 75-m zone, which were built as per the rules of the day, will be adversely impacted because of the change in rule. Changing buffer zones like this is not a good practice.”
Ramesh R., a property consultant, said there was neither awareness nor clarity over the NGT order in the realty market but if it was strictly implemented, the value of these properties would crash.
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The way out
R. Nagaraj Reddy, president, CREDAI-Karnataka, said the Supreme Court, while quashing a recent appeal by CREDAI against the NGT order, had asked the affected parties to challenge the order instead of the industry body. “Property owners in this zone, who are also law-abiding citizens, should seek recourse in the Supreme Court,” he suggested.
A builder said it was unfair to expect property owners to suffer losses and give up their properties owing to a change in rules.
“In an earlier case in the High Court over private properties in a buffer zone, the court had ruled that the government should acquire the land in the buffer zone after compensating land-owners, as it is the government’s duty to maintain a buffer zone. The same process should apply now, if at all this order is implemented,” he said.