How long is the wait for DDA flats?
If you are among the 10 lakh applicants who have applied for the Delhi Development Authority (DDA) housing scheme 2014, then you will easily relate to what I am talking about. On 17th November, I was eagerly awaiting the draw results. They had already postponed it twice so I was pretty sure the waiting game would be over soon – after all how many times can one postpone it?
I casually switched on the television set to catch up on the day’s news and there it was: “DDA draw is postponed, indefinitely.” The draw was supposed to happen on 10th November. Later it got postponed to November 12 and then November 17. I was infuriated at the delay. Patience is something we all lack in our busy lives.
Extending the draw date is not a point of concern for DDA as much as it is for applicants - after all DDA is earning interest on the amount accumulated. Consider this: DDA has accumulated a corpus of Rs 10,000 crore from 10 lakh applicants (the application money was Rs 1 lakh). At the rate of 4 per cent it should be earning around Rs 1 crore every day as interest. On the other hand applicants are losing notional interest they could have earned on the amount deposited with DDA. In its brochure, however, DDA has stated that it would not pay any interest on the registration amount for up to three months.
The scheme offers more than 25,000 flats. It was launched on 1 September and closed on 15 October (after extending the initial deadline of 9 October).
To understand the complications of DDA draw I tried finding out how the draw is conducted. I read it twice but still cannot tell you how it is done. Try reading this. It seems DDA has put in place high standards for creating a random sample of applicants. But my question is couldn’t it have been tested earlier? It would have been good if instead of extending the dates DDA could come out with a detailed explanation about what has gone wrong. The mere one line that it is taking more than eight hours is not enough for applicants.
Till January 2013, DDA has announced 44 housing registration schemes. It has allotted a total of 3,67,724 flats. But there are still plenty of people who still do not own a house. One of their big dreams in life is to have their own house. For those emotional people it would be nice if DDA could come up with one date for the draw. Any date when they are a 100 per cent sure about their systems.
Once DDA results are announced, the next round of wait would be for unsuccessful applicants who don’t get a flat in the draw. If past performance is any indicator, one should not rely much on DDA’s promise to refund money in one month’s time to unsuccessful applicants.