QUEEN’S ROAD: The Central government’s decision to let its Land Bill lapse will marginally increase the cost of the second phase of the Metro project.
The government will now go back to the UPA’s 2013 guidelines, extending four times the market rate as compensation under 13 laws the present government had sought to exempt.
Pradeep Singh Kharola, Managing Director, Bangalore Metro Rail Corporation, said, “The four-time compensation is for rural areas and not for the city, where land rates are already high,” he told City Express.
The BMRCL has set a March 2016 deadline for its land acquisition for Phase II, and by that time, work under Phase I is expected to be completed.
The Metro will start distributing compensation for land acquired for Phase II from this month.
Kharola said, “The Phase-II project won’t see drastic cost escalation as much of the project is within city limits, where land acquisition rates are twice the market rate. According to the 2013 Land Bill, compensation of three times the market rate is given for lands acquired within 5 km outside the city’s municipal limit, and after that it becomes four times.”
Phase II is mostly being constructed along city roads, on what is already government land, and underground. “We need to acquire land only for building stations and some land will be acquired on the periphery of the city, where we will have to pay a higher price,” said Kharola.