Large ancestral landholders on the city’s outskirts oppose move to restrict family partition of land at 2000 sq m

The draft notification issued by the Urban Development Department (UDD) on Saturday making changes to zonal regulations of the Revised Master Plan-2015 for Bengaluru, caps “plot requested for family partition” at 2000 sq m, essentially half an acre. Any plot above this will have to give up 48% of the land for roads and civic amenities, when split up and developed.

This has raised many hackles among those who hold large parcels of ancestral lands yet to be partitioned, especially on the city’s outskirts. Due to The Urban Land (Ceiling and Regulation) Act, 1976, which was repealed in 1999, there are no large land holdings in the core city. However, newer areas added to the city’s civic limits in 2007 still continue to have such parcels.

H.M. Chandrashekhar, a native of Hoodi, who has filed his objection to the draft, a copy of which is available with The Hindu, said that he has a plot of nearly an acre of ancestral land and another large plot on which the family runs a college, for which his mother has registered a will to be split between four brothers.

“Now if this rule is passed, we will have to give up nearly half of this land. Our family has already lost lands to development decades ago. Now we will be forced to part land again,” he rued.

He is not alone. M. Prakash, a former principal of a college, said he bought four acres of land in Mavallipura in 2000 and has a farm house. “I want to split the property between my two children, and I fear I will lose half of it,” he said.

Sriram, a resident of B. Narayanapura, Whitefield, said the family lost eight acres to development projects and now left with three acres, a part of which they now fear losing.

In the objection filed, Mr. Chandrashekhar argued that the limit of 2000 sq m is “arbitrary, unreasonable and liable to be reconsidered”. “The draft amendment does not disclose any planning rationale, infrastructure concern or public interest objective justifying the ceiling of 2,000 sq m,” he, arguing, “The planning regulations ought not to impose an artificial ceiling on the extent of property that can be divided among family members.”

Road network and civic amenities

However, a senior UDD official said that large land holdings was a big issue on the city’s outskirts, leading to very low road density adding to the traffic chaos. Neither are there enough parks and playgrounds in these areas. “If even now developers do not give up land for civic amenities, the problem will only worsen. The draft notification is well within law and in the larger public interest of the city,” the official argued.

Property consultant and developer K.R. Ramesh said the rule to part with land for civic amenities only kicks in for lands being developed into multiple plots. “A person can split a property among his progeny if it is agricultural land without attracting these provisions. If the land use is converted to non-agricultural use, then land has to be earmarked for civic amenities,” he said.