Govt issues old grant lease conversion policy

The federal government has issued the old grant lease conversion policy for the fifth time for five years in 44 cantonment boards across the country including the Rawalpindi and Chaklala cantonment boards.

For the first time, the five per cent surcharge for transferring residential and commercial old-grant properties to regular leases has been abolished and other hefty charges have been added. The policy will remain applicable from July 1, 2022, to July 1, 2027.

Around 100,000 old grant lease residential and commercial properties in cantonment boards across the country will be converted into regular leases by July 1, 2027. The properties of those who fail to do so can be taken into government custody.

It should be noted that paying millions of rupees against residential and commercial properties in the name of premium, development charges, and ground rent due in the ongoing five-year policy will not be feasible for most of the occupants of these dilapidated pre-Pakistan residential and commercial old grant lease properties in the cantonment limits.

With this policy, which has been continuously issued since 1996, 250 residential and 150 commercial old grant leases out of 5,500 properties in Rawalpindi and Chaklala cantonment boards have been given regular leases so far.

According to the revised policy of transferring the lease of old grant residential and commercial properties to regular lease, a token fee of Rs5000 has to be paid for the regular lease of residential property less than three marlas. A premium of 30 per cent of the deputy commissioner's rate has to be paid for a regular lease of a residential property of more than three marlas, which was earlier 10 per cent. An annual ground rent of Rs5 per square yard has to be paid, which was earlier Rs2 per square yard. Along with this, 10 per cent of the DC rate will have to be paid as development charges.

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Similarly, a premium of 60 per cent of the DC rate will be payable for the commercial lease of residential old grant property, which was earlier 50 per cent. Further, development charges of 10 per cent of the DC rate and annual ground rent of Rs10 per square yard will be payable, which was Rs4 per square yard earlier.

Meanwhile, for the commercial regular lease of old grant commercial property, a 69 per cent premium of DC rate, 10% development charges of DC rate and annual ground rent of Rs10 per square yard will have to be paid. Similarly, the illegal commercial use of the residential old grant lease property will be converted into a regular lease on payment of 100 per cent premium of DC rate for regular commercial lease, Rs10 per square yard annual ground rent and 10 per cent development charges of DC rate.

It should be noted that in Rawalpindi and Chaklala cantonment boards, which have 20 wards, there are thousands of residential and commercial old grant lease properties in the form of pre-establishment constructions, which the owners are allowed to repair, leaving these buildings dilapidated.

On the other hand, paying millions of rupees for residential and commercial for the regular lease of these buildings is beyond the affordability of these property owners.

Regarding the fifth policy in respect of the residential and commercial lease of old grant properties, cantonment sources say that on the one hand, a five per cent surcharge was abolished while on the other hand, the premium and grant rent was increased heavily, due to which once again this five-year lease policy was most likely to fail.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 24^th, 2023.