Agricultural lands cannot be directly used for residential
purpose. They need to be converted for using them for residential purposes by
paying conversion charges. The Special Deputy Commissioner is the competent
authority to permit conversion of agricultural land for non-agricultural purpose.
No building can be constructed on agricultural land without obtaining
conversion and other approvals from the concerned authorities. Residential
sites are to be formed only in the residentially converted land and such a land
should be in the residential zone as per zonal regulations for getting approval
for such conversion.
As per zonal regulation of Comprehensive Development Plan,
the Green Belt Area is meant only for agricultural activities. Non-converted
land continues to be agricultural land. There are various restrictions on sale
and purchase of agricultural land. In Bangalore, only the Bangalore Development
Authority (BDA) is the competent authority to approve the layout plan and to
get this approval the layout should have specified road width, residential
area, civic and other amenities. The Bangalore Metropolitan Regional
Development Authority (BMRDA) is the competent authority to approve sites on
the outskirts of Bangalore.
Middlemen and the local brokers, who have mastered the art of
marketing, motivate the innocent people to buy the revenue sites keeping them
in dark of the hassles involved in the purchase of revenue sites. These
middlemen normally pay a nominal sum as a token advance to the landlord and a
General Power of Attorney is obtained from them to deal with such properties.
Thereafter, they search for the prospective Purchasers. The middle men, like
double edged razors, hike the price of the land depending upon the situation
while, at the same time, they do not finally settle the account of the land
Owners.
In the recital of a Sale Deed, it is customary to mention how
the Seller has acquired his title, interests and rights over the immovable
property from origin to the end. In case of revenue sites, the brokers have
devised a very ingenious method to hide this fact. They merely mention in the
recital that the property is an ancestral property of the Seller. In this way
the property passes on from the (General Power of Attorney) GPA Holder to the
Purchaser.
There are several instances, where the land notified for
acquisition and the land granted for Schedule Caste people have been converted
into sites, where the Purchaser of such a site would not get any title of the
property. Then the Law stipulates that certain lands, when granted to the
Schedule Castes, will revert to them if purchased by others.
Generally, brokers will take GPA from the Land Owner for the
entire land and register in favour of the Purchaser; Most of the revenue sites
are registered on the strength of GPA. Very few people will take care to check
the legality of the GPA executed by the original Vendor. Nobody bothers to find
out whether the GPA is registered or not, whether the Executor of the GPA is
alive or not. If the Executor of the GPA is not alive the GPA transaction is
totally invalid. A joint GPA executed by two Owners becomes invalid if one of
them dies.
Form 9 and
Form 10
Originally, a property falling under the village Panchayath
area alone has the genuine site status. Form No.10 is for a house coming under
the Gramathana village Panchayath area and Form No.9 is for a vacant site
coming under the Gramathana village Panchayath area. The middlemen and some of
the revenue officials make bogus Forms No.9 and 10 and register immoveable
properties in favour of innocent Purchasers. Earlier, when the Urban Land
Ceiling Act was in force, thousands of revenue sites were registered by merely
mentioning in the Sale Deed the description as one square asbestos sheet house.
This was so done just to avoid application of the Urban Ceiling Act. After the
Urban Land Ceiling Act was abolished the term one square asbestos sheet house
was also removed from the real estate Agent's dictionary.
If the title deeds are not clear and does not establish
marketable title, it is very difficult to obtain bank loans for construction by
mortgaging these sites. Generally, these sites are situated on the City
outskirts. There will be no proper roads, electricity or water supply. There is
no scope for immediate development and after all this, if the prices of the
sites appreciate over a period of several years, the original Land Owner will
appear from nowhere and start cultivating the area. He will remove all the
boundary stones laid by the broker. The Purchaser will then find it difficult
to identify his property. In certain cases, the GPA Holder sells the same sites
to several persons and collects the money from all of them. Consequently,
marathon litigation awaits the Purchaser. The Laws are so complex that they
give rise to multiple interpretations.
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