Bengaluru: “The state government will be taking steps to regularise unauthorised constructions in 68 layouts built on 3,699 acres of BDA land” said Chief Minister Siddaramaiah said on Sunday June 21 at his home office ‘Krishna’. The area is estimated to have a market value of about Rs 6,000 crore.  

After completing his city inspection tour, Siddaramaiah said that the legal department was being consulted over these houses built between 25 and 30 years ago.  There are a total of 66,500 sites on BDA land presently.

He said they were also considering taking action against officials who broke the rules and allowed these illegal constructions to come up.

“Demolishing illegally built houses was causing a lot of problems, as we have seen  recently. So, we have decided to legalise them,” the chief minister said. By doing so, the BDA also will stand to gain revenue, he added.

The government’s move comes in the backdrop of public outcry over the demolition of houses in and around Sarakki lakebed and Banaswadi recently.

BDA commissioner T Sham Bhatt said houses built in the period between 1973 and 1986 could be legalised under the BDA Act under the section of ‘Reconvey of Land’. “We are now trying to see if it could be extended so that these houses too (built  25 to 30 years ago) could be legalised.”

The layouts in which illegal constructions figure are RMV II Stage, Koramangala Layout, HSR Layout, JP Nagar 7th, 8th and 9th Phase, Matadahalli, West of Chord Road 2nd, 3rd and 4th stage layouts, HRBR Layout, Mahalakshmi Layout (Nandini), Mahalakshmi Layout extension and Banashankari 2nd to 5th Stages.