Punjab
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2013-15: Mortgaging properties to support subsidies, state schemes
The Times of India, Dec 09 2015
Rohan Dua
Indiana ZONES - Punjab goes bust. Mortgages jails, widows ashram, asylum land, residential complexes
The last place from where you expect a state government to raise funds is jails and a shelter for widows.But that is precisely what the Punjab government has done in the past two years to tide over its severe financial crisis.
The Gandhi Vanita Ashram for widows in Jalandhar and the state jails at Bathinda, Amritsar and Goindwal are among the dozen official properties that the state government has mortgaged to raise a massive loan of Rs 2,100 crore to fill up its depleted coffers.
The widows' home has heritage value, as Mahatma Gandhi once stayed here while on a visit to Punjab. It was built in 1947, after Independence, for the widows among Partition refugees.
Documents from Punjab's urban development department and chief minister's office reveal that the government mortgaged the properties between 2013 and 2015 to support its subsidies and state schemes. The Akali Dal-BJP government is facing a debt of Rs 1.25 lakh crore, and has found it tough to even pay salaries to its staff. All the mortgage deeds signed between the Punjab Urban Development Authority (PUDA) -chaired by chief minister Parkash Singh Badal -and five nationalised banks have been accessed by TOI.
From lands meant for multiplexes and old district courts, to jails and residential complexes -the government has mortgaged nearly every type of establishment.
Gandhi Vanita Ashram, which houses 120 widows and a small school that educates 250 girls, sits at the top of the list. As many as 67 families live at the ashram. The staff and women are yet to be rehabilitated to the new complex being built for them.
According to the deed signed on December 31, 2013, the ashram's entire property -including offices, the pavement and parking area -have been mortgaged for Rs 250 crore. “The old building is already in a dilapidated condition,“ said an inmate who works as a tailor, adding that she feels very uncertain about her future.
The documents also show that 3.73 acres reserved for a multiplex by Amritsar Improvement Trust has been mortgaged for a Rs 100-crore loan from Andhra Bank at an interest rate of 10.25% annually . The money is to be repaid before March 2018.
Another Rs 400 crore has been raised against 11.28 acres on which Amritsar's old mental hospital stands.
While the 350-bed hospital has already been shifted to a new site, the doctors insist that the government should have simply extended the building's area instead of raising loans against the unused land. One doctor told TOI that they desperately need more beds to manage the rush.
Deputy chief minister Sukhbir Badal, who holds the housing and urban develop ment portfolio, was not avail able for comment. PUDA offi cials meanwhile dub the mortgaging as routine. The burgeoning interest on the loans has not deterred them “It is an economic model by which we can get money and use it for the right purposes We are trying to find ways to settle the fund crunch. We are paying back interest and not stopping the instalments to banks,“ said Manvesh Sidhu chief administrator, PUDA.
Besides, three residential sites, each in Jagraon, Mansa and Patiala, with nearly 3,000 residential and 400 commer cial plots yet to be sold to pub lic, have been mortgaged for Rs 750 crore loan with Canara Bank. In Jalandhar, the gov ernment has also mortgaged two more state offices includ ing an old building that until few years ago housed the dep uty commissioner and senior superintendent of police.
