Sector-53 General Housing Scheme of Chandigarh has come to a standstill once again. The Chandigarh Housing Board has decided that their deposit will be returned to the applicants participating in the survey for this scheme. More than 7000 applications were received for 372 houses in this survey.
People had deposited an amount of Rs 5000 to 10,000 to participate in this survey. However, the board says the plan has not been canceled. Due to increase in collector rate from April 1, the price of flats of this scheme has increased by Rs 50-60 lakh.
Therefore, it has been decided that the amount of applicants will be returned at the moment. A decision will be taken again in the next board meeting regarding the plan. In February 2025, the process was started for the General Housing Scheme of 372 houses.
Demand survey was completed on March 3, in which around 7300 people showed interest to buy flats of various categories. Those who submitted survey forms for Scheme A and B (three and two bedroom flats) paid Rs 10-10 thousand.
Each applicant had deposited Rs 5000 for EWS or C-Scheme. Through this, the board had raised about 4 crore rupees. In the survey of the survey, the Chandigarh Housing Board had said that if the scheme starts, this amount will be accommodated in the Ernest Money Deposit (EMD) of the flat.
On March 3, there was a better response after the demand survey, but the Chandigarh Housing Board officials did not take a timely decision. The District Administration issued a draft notification to increase the collector rate on 5 March.
After the collector rate was implemented, the potential value of the three bedroom flat was Rs 1.65 crore (without GST), which has now increased to about Rs 2.50 crore. Similarly, the value of two bedroom flats has also increased.
After the survey, some officials tried to reduce the number of EWS flats, but according to government criteria, the number of EWS flats is fixed according to the percentage.
Since 2016, the Housing Board has not launched any new General Housing Scheme. After about 9 years, this scheme was being introduced in Sector-53.
The chances of new housing in Chandigarh are decreasing. Chandigarh is a land locked city, where the development is to be done according to the master plan.