Sudipto Mondal/The Hindu

• Township will come up in three years, says authority commissioner 
• ‘Why cannot MUDA provide sites at reasonable rates?’
• ‘I decided to buy site elsewhere after my bad experiences’

Mangalore, Jul 31: While the Mangalore Urban Development Authority (MUDA) seems reluctant to shake itself out of its slumber, a large number of people in Mangalore city are foregoing their dream of owning a housing site. For some it is worse as they are falling prey to unscrupulous realtors. MUDA has not formed any residential layout in seven years.

A statement by a city-based realtor puts the debate on MUDA in perspective. K.C. Nayak of Mahabaleshwara Promoters and Builders Private Limited says, “Realtors will keep pushing land prices up if we are left to ourselves.”

Quoting the “Bangalore example”, Mr. Naik says that despite allegations of malpractices bodies such as the Bangalore Development Authority (BDA) have still managed to do a great service for the people of that city. He points out that the BDA forms residential layouts every few years in Bangalore and sites in these layouts are always cheaper than those available elsewhere.

“This does two things. One, it provides sites at reasonable rates to a small group of common people. But the greater service it does is to correct a market that might be quoting exorbitant prices,” Mr. Nayak explains. According to him, every time BDA forms a layout the prices of sites in that city go down.

“Why cannot the MUDA do the same for the people of this city?” he asks. “The effect of this is all too evident. The real estate market here has become unreasonable and speculative,” says Mukesh Bhatt (36) who has been looking for an affordable housing site in the city for the last three years without any success. Mr. Bhatt, who is a salaried person working in Bangalore, wants to come back to Mangalore as it is the place of his birth but feels that coming back to the city is going to remain an unfulfilled dream. “What I do not understand is why the prices are so high. In the case of Bangalore there is all-round growth but why is the Mangalore market getting excited?” he asks.

Citing his experience, G. Venkatraman says, “After several bad experiences with brokers I finally decided to buy land in another city,” he says. According to him, there is black-marketing by even the sellers.

“They want half the money in black and half in white. How can a salaried person like me afford to pay in black?” he asks.

Mr. Venkatraman, who was recently transferred to the city, feels that real estate brokers here are some of the most unreliable. His experience has been that the big realtors are safe to deal with. He says, “It is still alright for people like me who are looking to make small investments in the market.”

MUDA Commissioner M.K. Gadkar told The Hindu that a township would be formed on a 200-acre land at Chelaru and Padavu villages. He said that about 1,000 sites would be distributed to people in the area within two-three years. This was only the first phase of the township planned on a 615-acre land. MUDA was in the process of raising loans for the township, he said.