BANGALORE: While the Bruhat Bangalore Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) is planning to auction more than 6000 shops at the Palike markets in city, Merchants Association is preparing to move the court. BBMP holds 131 markets including KR Market, Johnson Market, Russel Market, Mavalli and Madivala markets. More than 6,000 shops in the markets are functioning for the past many decades.However, they are paying as less as Rs. 100 as rent. “Even though Palike markets are in prime locations, revenue flow from these shops nearly only Rs. 18 crore per year. Even then, shop owners fail to pay the rent. At present Rs. 53 crore revenue is pending from these shop owners. Every year, this revenue is adding up and Palike is facing problem. We are therefore bringing new market policy to auction the shops for a 30-year period. With this, Palike will earn more revenue too,” official from BBMP said.Further, the official said that funds from auctioning the shops would be put into a corpus. “The interest generated will be used for maintenance of these markets and other Palike requirements,” official said.Palike earlier used to lease the shops. However, in the course of time, original allottees transferred the ownership to different party. There are thousands of such illegal shops functioning in Palike markets. Officials were told to detect unauthorised transfer of ownership of the shops and cancel them immediately.On the other hand, Merchant Association is planning to move the court. Aiyub Khan, secretary, Market Merchant Association, said that in KR market alone there are 1,560 shops. “Most of the owners of these shops are poor. These shops were alloted many decades back to our ancestors and it is passing from generation to generation. Now if Palike is going to auction these shops, we do not have sufficient money to participate in the bidding. At the end, we will be vacated from the premises. We do not have any other source of income. Lakhs of people depend on in these shops. We will move the court,” he said.
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