Noida : Meltdown hits
Mega project
Developer Backs Down On Payment
Noida: So badly has Noida been hit by the economic meltdown that its most ambitious commercial area project, to be built on 3.82 lakh square metres in Sector 94, may not come through as the consortium concerned is unable to pay for the land as agreed.
The builders consortium, Business Parks and Town Planners (BPTP), is learnt to have written to New Okhla Industrial Development Authority to say that it is unable to pay it at the agreed rates. The consortium had beaten some major developers in an open bid for constructing a commercial and business complex in Sector 94 on March 11 last year. It had bid for the land at the rate of over Rs 1.30 lakh per square meter. And, while the consortium made an initial payment of more than Rs 1,300 crore of the Rs 5,000 crore at the time, as registration money and allotment money, it was unable to make any more payments.
Confirming this, NOIDA chairman, Lalit Srivastava, told this correspondent, ‘‘The government had recently announced a policy to deal with just such things in times of recession. The consortium will have to pay 10 per cent of the amount so far paid, to NOIDA, as penalty. It will also keep the land it has already been able to pay for. The rest of the land will be forfeited. Such defaulters have been asked to submit their proposals by June. But, this case is coming up for discussion in the NOIDA board this Friday.’’
A senior BPTP official said: ‘‘It is true that we are not able to pay for the land, but the turmoil in the global market is doing this to so many companies. This is why we have written to NOIDA to tell them that we would like to avail of the schemes the state government has announced for such cases. We are waiting for their reply.’’
Meanwhile, the number and value of land transactions in Noida, including Greater Noida, have gone down sharply. Sub-registrar Tej Singh Yadav told TOI: ‘‘We have been able to meet only 30 per cent of the target set for revenue recoveries in January. Last January, we met 47 per cent of the target. The number and total value of the registries done in the first 11 months of 2008 was about half of that of the corresponding period in 2007. It was only in the last 15 days of December that about half of the calendar year’s registries were done, in terms of both value and number. This was because in the last half of December people somehow got the mistaken impression that the state government was going to raise the property and rent agreement registration rates very soon.’’
Meanwhile, said a senior revenue official, sale and purchase of land and buildings have almost come to a standstill in Noida as well as Greater Noida. People are waiting for prices to fall further, before they make a move. Srivastava agreed that the situation was grim.
Lalit Kumar
BPTP to surrender biggest ever land deal in India
Realty player BPTP Ltd has applied for surrendering the Rs 5,006-crore land deal, the biggest ever in India, to New Okhla Industrial Development Authority (NOIDA) as it is unable to make the complete payment.
“BPTP has made an application to the Noida authority for surrender of (the) plot and are awaiting decision of NOIDA,” BPTP Director Sudhanshu Tripathi said in a statement.
The company said it made the application after the UP government, in its new policy, gave developers options to get their payment plan rescheduled and seek benefit of moratorium.
The policy had also allowed developers to surrender the plot after paying a penalty of 10 per cent of the amount that it had deposited to the authority. Companies will, however, not be returned back the balance money, but will be offered land for the amount left after paying the penalty.
BPTP had in 2008 bagged the 95-acre commercial plot at Sector 94, Noida, beating rivals, including DLF Ltd.
A BPTP spokesperson said the company has already paid about Rs 1,300 crore as a payment of the land and it has applied for retaining about 25 per cent of the land that it has paid for. “We were unable to pay the rest and had applied last month to the authority for surrendering about 75 per cent of the 95-acre plot, deducting 10 per cent penalty as per NOIDA’s guidelines,” the spokesperson added.
Last year, after outbidding DLF to win the 95-acre commercial plot in Noida for Rs 5,006 crore, in the country’s largest land deal, BPTP planned to invest over Rs 3,000 crore to build a ‘commercial city’ comprising office, retail, hotels and service apartments with a total saleable area of 10 million sqft.
It was required to pay 25 per cent of the land cost after winning the bid. The Delhi-based company had bagged the land from NOIDA emerging as the highest bidder with Rs 1,30,207 per sq mt against the reserve price of Rs 77,000 per sq mt. Omaxe and Ansal API also participated in the bidding process.
The 95-acre land deal was the biggest in the country in the value terms. Unitech had bagged 1,750 acres in Vizag at Rs 3,350 crore in 2007, while the company won 340 acres in NOIDA at Rs 1,582 crore in 2006. DLF had also clinched a 38-acre land deal in the national capital for Rs 1,675 crore.
The Times of India : February 04, 2009 , Pg : 7