Plot for Alagiris son under scanner

Plot for Alagiris son under scanner

Mahalingam Ponnusamy TNN

Chennai: Durai Dayanidhi,son of Union minister M K Alagiri,is under the state government scanner for getting a plot from the Tamil Nadu Housing Board (TNHB) under the governments discretionary quota (GDQ) during the DMK regime claiming that he was a social worker.
Documents with TOI show that the ministers son had declared in his TNHB application in 2007 that neither he nor his family owned a residence or plot anywhere.But an affidavit that Alagiri filed while contesting the 2009 Lok Sabha elections lists two plots in the name of Dayanidhi in Chennai one worth Rs 36.38 lakh on Tiger Varadachariyar Road in Tiruvanmiyur and another worth Rs 1.96 crore on Beemanna Mudali Street in Mylapore,besides a farmhouse at Etchambakkam in Tambaram taluk and a house in Kodaikanal.
The encumbrance certificate for the Tiruvanmiyur property obtained by TOI shows that it was bought by Alagiri on March 24,2004,in Dayanidhis name.The certificate shows the value of the property as Rs 97.65 lakh.The first purchaser,A Ramachandran,bought the unoccupied plot from the Tamil Nadu Housing Board on February 5,2004,and a month later transferred it to Dayanidhi.Alagiri signed the sale agreement as Dayanidhi was a minor then.
ATNHB reply to an RTI application shows that Dayanidhi concealed this information to buy a 4,114-sqft plot from the TNHB at Sholinganallur in Kancheepuram district under the GDQ in 2007.Such allotment is done only for people who dont own a residence or land in corporation limits or first and special grade municipalities.To buy the land,Dayanidhi apparently gave a false affidavit,saying he or his family members didnt own a house or plot.Alagiris affidavit says he owns four plots and three houses,while his wife has five plots,two commercial buildings and a flat at Madhavaram.
The allotment was made through a government order (No.36) of the housing and urban development department on February 2,2007.As per TNHB rules,the allotment would stand cancelled if it is proved that the applicant gave wrong information to obtain it.
V Gopalakrishnan,an RTI activist who collected the documents,said Dayanidhi got the allotment under the social worker category though he is a businessman,with a partnership in film production house Cloud Nine Movies.

Landing in trouble

Durai Dayanidhi bought 4,114sqft plot from TNHB in Sholinganallur
In 2007,he gave an affidavit saying he or his family members did not own a house/plot

But MK Alagiris election affidavit in 2009 listed four properties in Dayanidhis name

These include two plots in Chennai,a farmhouse in Tambaram & a house in Kodaikanal




Alagiri son paid.24L for land


Dayanidhi paid Rs 24,13,800 as initial deposit for the allotment and continued paying Rs 68,600 a month to clear the balance dues.He mentioned his annualincome asonly Rs 9 lakh in the application form.The government never bothered to check if the applicant owned a residence.Most of the allotments were made without assessing the repaying capacity of the applicant, said Gopalakrishnan.
The TNHB,which has a large land bank,had the GDQ system,under which 15% of allotments could be done by the government.Single /deserted women,widows,social workers,physically handicapped persons,defence personnel,ex-servicemen,eminent persons in the field of science,arts,literature,economics,public administration and sports,freedom fighters;government servants with unblemished service records,employees of PSUs,central government undertakings and nationalized banks,PF institutions,journalists,university staff,and employees of local bodies and municipalities were eligible for getting allocations under the GDQ.The quota was scrapped by the erstwhile DMK government earlier this year after the housing board land allocation scam broke out.