Click to play videoKolkata: The three-and-a-half acre plot adjacent to the Eastern Metropolitan Bypass is Kolkata Municipal Corporation's newest gold mine.
After fetching a whopping Rs 276 crore from an auction of a five-acre plot last year, the Kolkata Municipal Corporation is all set to repeat the act.
The civic body believes it can raise a decent sum for civic infrastructure works by leasing out the prime commercial area plot.
"This kind of conscious and planned monetisation of idle public land can really bring good dividends for both developers as well as the civic body,” says Commissioner, Kolkata Municipal Corporation, Alapan Bandyopadhyay.
Keen at having a five-star hotel on the plot, the civic body is inviting bids from companies with at least three years' experience in the hospitality business.
Last October, the corporation auctioned a five-acre plot to LIC at a record price of over Rs 55 crore. And it feels there is scope for more.
"Most of the 5 star hotels in the city are going at about 80 to 85 per cent occupancy rate whereas 60 per cent would give them good profits. The rates are very high, land is scarce, and if the civic body gives land to the market, it should be normally speaking a win-win situation,” says Bandyopadhyay.
Scarcity of land in the city has forced the Bengal government to convince IT companies to look for space in the adjacent districts.
But with the civic body willing to part with its properties, a huge land bank is getting unlocked.
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