BENGALURU: Members of a Resident Welfare Association (RWA) are preparing to file public interest litigation seeking quashing of the new Floor to Area Ratio (FAR) guidelines set by the new zoning regulations.
FAR is the ratio of total floor area of a building to the area of the plot on which it stands. President of Citizen Action Forum N S Mukunda said as per the new regulations, the FAR index component has been split into two components, one of them called premium FAR. As a result, there has been a reduction on existing FAR. So if residents want to construct additional floors, they will have to pay as per the premium FAR, which is calculated by taking into account 50 per cent of the guidance value of the land in the area.
According to Mukunda, this will make things very expensive for residents. As an example, he said for a building on a 60X40 site, with a conservative price of Rs 4,000 per sqft, the premium FAR would come up to more than Rs19 lakh. Mukunda added that the new rules will put a strain on civic amenities and lead to ‘gentrification’ of the city. Explaining the term, Mukunda said long-time residents of core areas won’t be able to afford payment of premium FAR and will hence move to peripheral areas of the city.