Faux pas by MUDA?

Mysore/Mysuru: An incident of the wife of a late former IFS Officer returning the site allotted to her husband by Mysuru Urban  Development Authority (MUDA) has now come to light. She took the decision after MUDA authorities served a notice to her for providing incomplete and false information and also to sell the same site for a big sum. 

Following media  reports, MUDA Commissioner Dr. D. B. Natesh has issued a clarification claiming that this incident has not caused any financial loss to the Authority and there is no illegality in it.  The clarification  is as follows: 

Upon an application by the then IFS Officer Nagaraj, the Mysuru Urban Development Authority allotted a 15mtx24mt (50’x80’) site (No.3165) to him in Vijayanagar Fourth Stage, Second Phase, on Sept. 8, 1994 on payment of Rs. 1.5 lakh. Later MUDA issued a lease-cum-sale deed to Nagaraj on Dec. 13, 1996, following which the possession certificate was issued on Jan. 3, 1997. Years later, Nagaraj, in a letter to MUDA on April 26, 2002, said that he was returning the site as he had got a site at Bengaluru from Bangalore Metropolitan Co-operative Housing Society Ltd. But MUDA did not respond. 

After a couple of years, Nagaraj wrote another letter to MUDA on Sept. 3, 2004, requesting the Authority to continue with the site allotment that was in his name. But MUDA again failed to respond to his  request. 

 Now, 16 years later, J. Shashikala, wife of  retired IFS Officer Nagaraj, wrote a letter to the Government on Aug. 13, 2020 stating that her husband died on Aug. 22, 2019 and as such, the documents pertaining to the 15mtx24mt site allotted to her husband, be transferred  jointly to her and her son Samarth’s name. Following the letter, the Government directed MUDA to take action in                                    this regard. 

Later Shashikala sought MUDA to transfer documents to her name. Subsequent to her appeal, MUDA while scrutinising the documents, found that the records of the site remained in the name of the allottee, following which MUDA did Khata (Pauti Khata) in the name of Shashikala. 

After some days, she applied for Title Deed  on Sept.4, 2020 and the same was issued on Sept. 21, 2020, after charging a penalty of Rs. 21,60,000. 

Later, the MUDA Chairman H.V. Rajeev, in a note issued on Sept. 24, 2020  directed  the officials to check whether all the procedures were followed in respect of Khata transfer and to take necessary action in case any discrepancies or violation of norms in the procedure. Subsequently, the files pertaining to the site were verified, when the Cash Book entry showed that the Rs. 1.5 lakh that had been paid in 1994 towards the cost of the site had been returned to the allottee Nagaraj on Nov. 28, 2006 itself. It is at this juncture that MUDA got suspicious and decided to issue a notice to Shashikala for misleading MUDA by providing incomplete and false information. 

Then MUDA issued a notice to Shashikala on Nov. 5, 2020 charging her of attempting to grab  and sell the site that had already been returned by her husband by providing false and incomplete information, in order to make huge profit. The notice also said that why not a criminal action be taken against her for fraudulent practices and asked her to return the registered Title Deed and all other records pertaining to the said site at Vijayanagar Fourth Stage, in person, within 7 days of                                                 the notice. 

Responding to the notice, Shashikala visited MUDA office on Nov. 10, 2020 and returned all the documents pertaining to the site. She also appealed MUDA not to initiate any legal action against her as she was deeply depressed by the demise of her husband and the wrong had happened due to lack of information and negligence. 

Following the return of all documents by Shashikala, the MUDA authorities on Nov. 10, 2020, cancelled the site’s Title Deed issued on Sept. 21, 2020, the clarification said.

On alleged lapses on the part of MUDA, the authorities said that no recordings were made in Page 130 of Ledger No. 161 regarding the cancellation of the allotment of the site after it was returned to MUDA by the original allottee Nagaraj. 

Further, the non availability of any entries, recordings or notings in respect of return of Rs. 1.5 lakh (paid towards the cost of site) made by MUDA to the original allottee on Nov. 28, 2006, led the MUDA authorities to consider Shashikala’s plea for issuance of Pauti Khata and Title Deed in respect of the site. Also, the issuance is attributed to the missing pages after Paragraph 52 of office notes.

Meanwhile, amidst all these clarifications, doubts have surfaced on how MUDA  allegedly ‘re-allotted’ the site to Shashikala, wife of the original allottee Nagaraj, on Sept. 21, 2020, after a long gap of 18 years, by collecting the 1994 price of Rs. 1,50,500.

It is alleged that Shashikala  after getting the site ‘re-allotted’, reportedly sold the site for a whopping Rs. 83,92,320 to another woman on the same day itself (Sept. 21, 2020).

The MUDA Commissioner has promised to investigate into the missing of documents and punish those found responsible for this act of negligence.