Despite public-private partnership being the flavour of the season, the Government seems to be in no mood to speed up regulatory clearances.

Over five years after it bagged the commercial rights of Delhi Metro’s Akshardham’s station, Parsvnath Ltd is unable to cash on the booming retail scenario.

The reason: Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) is unable to get the required local Government clearance to hand over the commercial land use rights to Parsvnath.

The real estate player had bagged the lease rights for 30 years to develop the station. Parsvnath has completed its commitment with the station being operational for over two years now.

“The land use of the Akshardham station’s project with Parsvnath is Ridge/ River Bed. For commercial development land use, change is to be approved by Delhi Development Authority. DMRC is pushing with DDA for land-use change so that commercial development can be made,” DMRC said.

Parsvnath was supposed to build the Akshardham metro station and shopping mall in approximately 0.365 million sq ft area.

When contacted, Mr Pradeep Jain, Chairman, Parsvnath Developers, also echoed the sentiments of DMRC but declined to provide any number on the estimated loss due to delay.

Incidentally, French retailer Carrefour had opened its maiden cash-and-carry outlet near Seelampur metro station. Stating that projects at Inderlok, Pratapnagar and Shahdra were fully functional and Seelampur was partially operational, he said the company is all set to open malls at Azadpur and Akshardham in next six months.

“Space has been leased out to various retailers and the market is witnessing an increase in rentals.” The area reportedly commands a rental of Rs 200 a sq ft.

Parsvnath Developers had earlier said that it was hoping to mop up Rs 300 crore from rental income this year.

Parsvnath was one of the early movers in building stations along the metro rail. It is developing 15 projects comprising one commercial office space, two metro stations and 12 malls outside metro stations, all on DMRC land. Of these 15 projects, Parsvnath has successfully completed nine projects with a saleable area of 0.75 million sq ft.

Bindu.menon@thehindu.co.in

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