Noida Properties in the Eye of Storm

The Supreme Court judgment passed by justices H S Bedi and Dalveer Bhandari against an application by the Army Welfare Housing Organisation and others, in effect, pulls the rug from under the feet of cooperative flat owners in Noida. Pursuant to the ruling flat owners have to register individually according to prevailing circle rates. 15000 flat owners in NOIDA will be directly affected by this ruling; they will end up being poorer by Rs. 2 to Rs. 3 lakh in stamp duty and the government richer by about Rs. 100 crores. Noida and Greater Noida have witnessed a property boom resulting in explosive price increases. The ruling means that instead of valuation at the original price of around Rs. 10 to 11 lakhs, flat owners will have to pay stamp duty on current market rates of Rs. 60 lakhs for the same property.

While this is going on, the land row between farmers, Noida Authorities and builders as well as buyers took a new turn with the Allahabad High Court giving Noida Authority a time of 2 weeks to resolve the issue. Negotiations are likely to be reopened with a hopefully better outcome this time around. The willingness of Balwinder Kumar, Chairperson of Noida Authority to negotiate with the farmers may be taken as a positive sign and a step to sorting out the vexatious matter. A positive resolution will bring forth a collective sigh of relief from all involved.