In a move that will immediately impact land transactions, Bengaluru-based Revenue Minister R. Ashoka announced yesterday that the state government will amend the current legislation to permit the conversion of agricultural plots for non-agricultural use within a week.
Ashoka stated that the new program aims to stop corrupt practices by government officers at different levels and to avoid requiring landowners to endure needless hassles. According to him, it currently takes six to eight months for people who bought land to convert.
The Minister stated that although the conversion fee in rural areas will remain unchanged, residents in cities and semi-urban areas will be required to pay two or three times as much. The Deputy Commissioners’ offices, which handle all types of land conversion to form layouts and industrial areas, will implement a single-window system.
The Revenue Department now follows protocol when sending the DC’s land conversion application to the planning authority. The file then goes to the Tahsildar, the Revenue Inspector, the Village Accountant, and all land acquisition officers.
By the time the land gets converted, it takes around six to eight months and needs multiple reports, Ashoka said. He said some constraints would apply to those seeking to convert the land. For instance, the land for which conversion is necessary should not be encroached on or reserved for the welfare of Scheduled Castes or Scheduled Tribes.
The applicant must submit an affidavit and pay the required cost of converting the land. An agricultural landowner may use the affidavit-based conversion to convert their land to any non-agricultural use by submitting a self-declaration by the authorized master plan for that specific area.
The conversion is impossible if a specific area exists in the master plan as a green zone. If the master plan has not yet been approved for the area, it will be based on self-declaration, given that the non-agricultural use has been approved by the relevant authorities by the Karnataka Town and Country Planning Act. According to Ashoka, the conversion will be canceled and the applicant will forfeit the application fee if false affidavits are submitted or if the affidavit has any gaps or ambiguities.