Akalis tried to shift IIM to Bathinda: Joshi

Ruchika M Khanna

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, August 4

The Indian Institute of Management (IIM) to be set up in Manawala village, 15 km from Amritsar, is courting controversy even before the prestigious institute comes into existence. From murmurings over politics of initial efforts to shift this institute from Amritsar to Bathinda or Jalandhar, or allegations of favours meted out to the company whose land has been bought to build the institute, the project is getting mired in controversies.

BJP leader and Local Bodies Minister Anil Joshi insists that he is responsible for the IIM being sanctioned for Amritsar. “But in spite of repeated efforts made by the Punjab government and the Amritsar administration to ‘shoo away’ the team of Ministry of Human Resources Development, I took the initiative and approached Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley to ensure that the project was not shifted out of Amritsar,” he told The Tribune after the Cabinet meeting here yesterday.

A decision on allotting 60 acres land in Manawala village for the IIM was taken in the meeting.

“Since I was wary that the (state) government might rethink on changing the site for the IIM, I quickly gave orders and got Rs15 crore deposited from Amritsar Improvement Trust before the Cabinet meeting,” he told The Tribune.

Officials in Chief Minister’s Office, however, have denied that any attempt was made to shift the IIM from Amritsar to Bathinda or any other district.

“The state government had recommended three sites for the IIM at Amritsar == near Ajnala, adjacent to the Amritsar Central Jail and some land owned by Guru Nanak Dev University. While the first two sites were rejected by the central team, authorities in GNDU, including the staff, were unwilling to part with the university land. Thus, we zeroed in on this piece of land owned by New World Buildcon Pvt Ltd and abuts the highway,” said a top official in the CMO.

He said though the company owned 146 acres of land, the government had decided to buy 60 acres at the rate of Rs1.25 crore per acre, and the Cabinet had approved to buy this land to be handed over for the IIM for Rs75 crore. The remaining 86 acres of land would be used to carve a residential colony under the 80: 20 policy of the Housing Department.

Under this policy, the residential colony will be developed by the state government, which after deducting the project cost, will share the profits accrued with the developer on a 80:20 basis, with 80 per cent profit going to the developer.

The Tribune has learnt that in yesterday’s meeting, the Cabinet has also allowed quite a few concessions to the builder. Under the existing norms, only 55 per cent of the area can be developed as residential plots, and the remaining to be left for external development. However, in this case, the developer is allowed to use 62 per cent (additional 7 per cent) area for carving plots.

Also, the mandatory reservation of area for plots for Economically Weaker Sections (EWS) has been done away with. Even the change in land use (CLU) charges that the developer is to pay will be adjusted while calculating the project cost.

In spite of reservations being expressed in the government over the high cost at which the land is being bought (Rs1.25 crore per acre, uniform for entire chunk of land, and not just land abutting the highway), senior government officials cailm that the reason for allowing the above concessions was that the government is buying the land for the IIM at a rate less than the existing market rate, and decided to compensate the owner of the land.

Efforts were made by the state government and the Amritsar administration to shoo away the team of Ministry of Human Resources Development. I took the initiative and approached Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley to ensure that the prestigious project was not shifted out of Amritsar. — Anil Joshi, local bodies minister