Congress submits Rs 25 lakh rent cheque

NEW DELHI: The BJP-led government and Congress are on the collision course over the rent paid by the principal Opposition party for its iconic headquarters at 24 Akbar Road and three other Lutyens bungalows.

Even as the government is deciding whether it will evict Congress from the four bungalows or avoid a political controversy and extend the lease, the party has submitted a rent cheque of Rs 25 lakh towards “special licence fee” from December 2015 till March 2017. However, as per directorate of estates calculation, the Congress has ran a rent bill of Rs 2.7 crore.

According to sources, the directorate has included minimum penal rate of interest chargeable from the Congress for overstaying in the four bungalows —24 Akbar Road, 26 Akbar Road, 5 Raisina Road and C-II/109 Chanakyapuri.

The Modi government had triggered a political controversy when directorate of estates had served a notice in January 2015 saying the lease of the bungalows had expired and it would have to pay “damage rate of licence fee”.

Congress was allotted land in June 2010 for building a party office on 9-A Rouse Avenue. As per the government policy on allotment of land to political parties, a party gets three years to build its office after allotment of land.

Therefore, the party was required to vacate the four bungalows leased to it by June 2013. After Congress was served a notice in January 2015, it got revised building plans for its new office sanctioned from North Delhi Municipal Corporation According to sources, the directorate has calculated the rent bill and forwarded it to urban development secretary.

The difference between the subsidised monthly rent being paid and the market rate — "damage charges" in the directorate's parlance — is about Rs 2 lakh per month for a Type VIII bungalow and Rs 70,000 for a Type VI bungalow.