A Kashmiri language word, Sangarmall literally means the early dawn. It is the name given to a prestigious Shopping Complex in high commercial locale of Srinagar city owned by the Srinagar Development Authority. In all, it has 126 spaces including shops, restaurants and kiosks in its first phase and so far 80 of them have been sold and 46 are unsold. The three Phase Sangarmall project was left half way by the SDA at I-phase due to lack of funds and political interference in recovering the amount from the allottees.
Put simply, spaces were allotted to bidders who were required to pay 50 per cent of the premium before being eligible for issuance of formal permission to open their shops etc. It is found that 21 allottees are the major defaulters and their outstanding premium is Rs 8.06 crore, interest on premium is Rs 3.49 crore and outstanding rent is Rs 88 lakh with Rs 16 lakh as interest on rent. In total Srinagar Development Authority is unable to recover the outstanding arrears of premium to the tune of 12.6 crore rupees.
This, too, seems a classical case of nepotism and favourtism and willingness of the Srinagar Development Authority to compromise with rules and regulations. How come that SDA is soft paddling with the cases of failure on the part of contracting partners and allowing huge amounts to remain pending indefinitely? Maybe some of these defaulters of Sangarmall Complex are influential people with strong political clout and that is the reason why SDA does not pick up courage to handle with politically influential persons with strong financial backing.
Is Srinagar Development Authority in league with the defaulters of Sangarmall Shopping Complex? Are politicians and others part of this game? We do not know what proper terminology will explain this state of affairs. What are the conditions and criteria for making allotment of the spaces in this complex? And finally, if there is no written permission from the SDA for taking possession of the allotted spaces with having made only 50 per cent of the payment of premium, how come some of the defaulters have taken possession of their spaces and are already running their brisk business earning thousands and lakhs of rupees per day. We think that before trying to reach the defaulters, the authorities should bring the SDA authorities to book for non implementation of the rules and regulations of making allotments.
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