Delhi Land Pooling Policy




With an objective to expand the urban limits of Delhi, this policy is expected to benefit around 1 crore people, with more than 17 lakh new houses being constructed for people living in Delhi.

NEW DELHI: With the launch of its single window clearance portal last month, the Delhi Development Authority (DDA) and Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs (MoHUA) have finally initiated the process for pooling land from 95 villages for development. In May 2017, these villages had been notified as “urban areas” and declared “development areas”.

With an objective to expand the urban limits of Delhi, this policy is expected to benefit around 1 crore people, with more than 17 lakh new houses being constructed for people living in Delhi. It will unlock 44,691 hectare of land for planned development and new housing units.

Land Pooling

Land owners living in notified villages can pool their land either themselves or with the help of private developers and hand it over to DDA, who will be responsible for developing infrastructure before returning it to the owner. The DDA online portal is available for land owners to submit their applications for transparency and faster approval. “The process to submit the application for land pooling started last month. We are also setting up help desks to help land owners file their applications online. The portal will be active for six months initially but we may extend the deadline depending on the circumstances after six months,” explains Tarun Kapoor, vice chairman, DDA.

Delay and Dispute

In July 2013, this policy was approved by DDA and notified by the Ministry of Housing and Urban Development in September 2013. The operational rules of this policy were approved by the ministry in May 2015. Earlier, the policy got stuck in a dispute between DDA and the Delhi government as the latter was demanding 10% from DDA’s share of the pooled land to develop hospitals, schools, etc. These 95 villages come under the Delhi Development Act of 1957 in 5 zones – K-1, Zone-L, Zone-N, Zone-P-II and Zone-J. These zones have 20, 30, 21, 23 and 1 village, respectively.

Distribution of Land

Under the Land Pooling Policy, 60% of the pooled land will be returned to land owners after infrastructure development, if the pooled land is 20 hectares and above. If the land pooled is between 2 and 20 hectares, then 48% will be returned to the land owners. Of the 60% of returned land, 53% will be for residential purpose, 5% for city level commercial use and 2% for public and semi-public use. In the second case, the same will be 43%, 3% and 2%, respectively.

Affordable Housing

One of the most attractive features of this policy is extra FAR of 15% for affordable housing. These houses will be built for the Economically Weaker Section (EWS) and shall be 32-40 sq m. Half of this housing stock will be retained by the Developer Entity to house community service people working for the residents/owners of the Group Housing. These houses will be built at the site or at premises contiguous to the site allotted. The other half of affordable houses will be sold to DDA at the base cost of Rs 2,000 per sq ft for further sale to beneficiaries.

The policy allows an FAR of 200 for group housing/residential use. “It is expected to generate about 17 Lakh dwelling units to house approximately 76 lakh people. In order to promote affordable and inclusive housing, FAR of 15%, over and above the maximum permissible residential FAR, has also been allowed for EWS/affordable housing. This will go a long way in meeting the goals of Housing for All,” said Housing and Urban Affairs minister, Hardeep Singh Puri.

Role of RERA

Out of the total 17 lakh dwelling units, more than 05 lakh will be for EWS. Construction of houses will be done as per RERA norms. “All construction of houses will be done according to RERA rules. One should not worry about poor construction or delayed delivery. Those are pre-RERA problems,” said Durga Shankar Mishra, Secretary in MoHUA.

Under this policy a sector will be considered eligible only when a minimum 70% of the developable area is pooled. DDA will facilitate the verification of pooled land from the Revenue Department, GNCTD through the Single Window System. DDA will act as a facilitator and will have no role in development of housing units or any other development by private developers. It will create social infrastructure like water, electricity and roads.

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