Army welfare Housing Organisation: Chennai Project

ByDeepti | Published August 16, 2011

AWHO- Chennai
Comment: Can Jawans who form 95% of Veterans afford such houses built as a welfare measure. It suits and benefits money spinners, real estate developers and agents. Do not rush for lucrative/dream offers. Remember greed traps you...

Army Welfare Housing Organisation demystified

Preamble
AWHO was created in 1978, with the aim of providing houses to Army personnel at low cost. According to its charter, as given on its web site click me, the AWHO functions on ‘No Profit No Loss’ basis. It is a ‘private society’, registered under the Societies Registration Act XXI of 1860. The AWHO is located in Army accommodation in Kashmir House, alongside the E-in-C’s Branch of Army HQ and it has has many serving personnel posted or attached to it; it is run by an executive committee of which the Adjutant General is the ex –officio chairman.

AWHO is not part of the Government. A full time Chairman and all the members of the board of management are ex-offcio. There is no individual as such as Chairman. The Chairmanship rotates as postings are changed. As far as meeting of the general body is concerned, in this particular society, as registered under the Societies Act, there is no such thing as the general body. It is the board of management that runs the society. The members meet regularly, once a year.

Facts and Facets
The AWHO recovers the cost of land as well as construction in advance. Hence 100% of the cost of the houses is recovered several years before the house is handed over. So, in effect, the AWHO does not spend any money of its own, and owns neither the land nor the houses its builds.

Payment of double stamp duty by the members for the land; once when AWHO buys the land from the original land owner (using their funds) and again when AWHO transfers the houses to them.

AWHO transfers only the dwelling unit and not the proportional share of the land, which the member has already paid for. This is contrary to the Transfer of Properties Act as well as the Apartment Owners Act.

AWHO offers to transfer the title of the land to the RWAs provided they pay the stamp duty. This means that the members pay stamp duty thrice, for land which had been purchased by them in the first instance. As a result, very few RWAs have agreed to do this, and the title of the land continues to be with the AWHO.

If a member wishes to sell the flat, he has to apply to the AWHO for an No Objection Certificate (NOC). The AWHO charges Rs 10,000/- from the Seller as well as the Buyer. To justify the recovery, the buyer, even if he is civilian, is made a member of the AWHO. The new buyer has to give an undertaking that he will not sell or rent out the flat without permission of the AWHO. In effect, it ensures that the AWHO makes Rs 20,000 every time the flat is sold. There is no record of the amount realised on this account by AWHO. NOC's are real money spinners as real estate prices gallop. Civilians, Industrialists and even movie actors throng to buy AWHO flats. If more than 50% of all AWHO constructed houses are owned by Civilians, is the Army looking after civilians welfare?. The civilians are prepared to even pay bribes to the tune of couple of lakhs of rupees to get the NOC and become AWHO members. It is the NOC tutorial from AWHO that is spreading its tentacles to Land Scams like the one that recently surfaced at Siliguri.

AWHO neither follows the guidelines stipulated under the Consumer Protection Act nor divulges information to its own members under the RTI Act. The website does not provide any statistical information from the date of inception of the AWHO Society in 1978 to date like:

Number of housing projects completed location wise, number of dwelling units constructed, names of allotees rank wise.

Minutes of AGM and audited yearly accounts

Gestation period of projects location wise and cost projected and actual cost on allotment

Number of civilians who own AWHO constructed houses since its inception.

Contract obligation for repair and maintenance, garden and landscaping, amenities provided like play grounds, swimming pool, gym etc...

Observations
Track record of last 30 years not discernible in the public domain. Presently what can be perceived from AWHO web page is that on an average about 10% officers who retire annually become AWHO members and are allotted a house. JCO's, NCO's and ORs have a dismal allotment rate of less than 1% who retire annually. This is truly a pro officer organisation and not a welfare organisation for all ranks. This is in direct contradiction to Chetwode Motto by which every officer swears!

AWHO runs on its own steam in a typical bureaucratic style and is accountable to nobody. The Army has already washed its hands of the AWHO. The Registrar of Societies has no control or information about AWHO activities. The common soldiers officers, JCOs and OR, feel that it is an Army set up, which will look after their interests! Less than 1% of soldiers get a dwelling unit through AWHO so how can this be called Welfare for troops for the remaining 99% of soldiers. Who then are real beneficiaries for whom this welfare organisation is set up?
AWHO
Related Story on NOC
Defence minister A K Antony, on his part, warned the Army that such cases “not only damage its image” but also “adversely affect the ability of senior officers to measure up to the expectations of the men they lead”.
Sukna land scam: Lt-Gen faces court martial
click here to read more about Army Welfare Organisations

Myths Busted

Dear Editor of Times of India,

1. This in reference to the article carried in your newspaper, New Delhi Edition, 30 Mar 2008 titled Cost to Govt 4 Times the salary on paper. Times of India: 4 times the salary on paper

2. I think the article is totally misleading and will spread misinformation amongst the masses! How has Ashish Sinha and XLRI Jamshedpur arrived at the conclusion that Cost to Government (CTG) of Armed Forces officers is 4.5 times of the salary is baffling. The conclusion is scandalous, blasphemous and in poor taste! Ironically, these are the same arguments which have been presented in the VI Pay Commission report while fixing the salaries of defence Forces officers. Let me decimate these so called 'intangibles' given by Ashish Sinha and possibly XLRI Jamshedpur in support of this conclusion one by one.

3. Housing : Where are these 'sprawling bungalows' in which the defence officers are supposedly living. Being an Army Wife of an officer who has had an unblemished 31 years career in the Army so far and who has not done so badly, I have never ever lived in any of these sprawling bungalows. We have been always been allotted dilapidated flats, crumbling at the seams and the houses and the colonies represent Bombay Chawls. Mostly even this sub- standard accommodation is not available and one has to make do with temporary arrangements ranging from a single room in a crumbling British era building, to a lower class of accommodation till one finally gets the authorised accommodation (Mind you it is 1500 square feet and not 3500 square feet as stated by the VI pay commission in its report). If one gets authorised scale of accommodation at all before one gets posted out. All this in the same station involving two to three shifting's in a two years tenure. The houses are poorly constructed to begin with and are maintained by an organisation called MES (Has XLRI interacted with MES?). The icing on the cake is provided by MES by simultaneously charging rent for all the accommodations (once occupied by you in this shifting process). It is often very late that one realises that one is supposedly occupying so many accommodations simultaneously on paper and being charged for them! The sorting out process which involves another such organisation as the MES, gives one a real taste of the bureaucratic process! So much for the sprawling bungalows!

4. CSD: What is available in the CSD and how much of these items does one buy monthly? The total items purchased per month do not cost more than Rs 600/- to 700/- and the saving accrued is not more than Rs 200/- per month i.e. if one discounts the effort involved to get to the CSD (i.e. when it is open) provided the required item is available and finally the quality is good and competitive brands and contemporary brands are available. With the retail revolution now taking place in the country, most of the times better stuff is available in the market at lesser or same rates and then these can be bought at 11.00 p.m at night! In my entire life as an army wife (25 years), I do not think we have saved more than Rs 70,000/- by buying things from CSD. This includes purchase of a car! So much for CSD contributing to 4.5 times CTG!

5. House Building Advance: Please tell XLRI Jamshedpur and Ashish Sinha to publish factual details of total housing loans taken by Army Officers from private banks (HDFC, ICICI) vis-à-vis the government loan. The details will be eye opener! Haat kangan ko arsi kya, parhe likhe ko pharsi kya! Had these Govt loans been so easily available and so lucrative, 90% loans would not be taken by officers from private banks!

6. 90 Days Leave: You need leave when you serve away from families. Let Ashish Sinha do a stint in a field area and probably then he'll start campaigning for even more leave for soldiers. Secondly, which soldier gets full quota of leave? Lastly, do not private companies give all expenses paid holidays to their employees? Any such parallel in a govt job?

7. Travel Passes: Need for travel arises only because one serves away from home. Even then, the annual saving on account of subsidised travel by any average army family (including travel not necessitated by service conditions and for personal purposes alone) cannot exceed Rs 4- 5 K annually. Mind you, this figure too is on the higher side!

8. I guess it has become rather fashionable to talk about the abnormal privileges being enjoyed by defence services. Some other so called perks have not been touched upon in your article hence I need not elaborate on those and make efforts to decimate them too. But I assure you that they too are all a fallacy and are easily torn to shreds.

9. Finally, I have one suggestion to make to the powers that be and to those who are responsible for perpetrating this fallacy that an army officer's CTG is 4.5 times his salary – please withdraw all such intangibles CSD, govt houses (ram shackles), free rations, form D and warrants, 50% air travel concession, (who travels and when?) orderlies and so on; and pay us 4.5 times of what has been proposed by the Sixth Pay Commission! Acceptable? I am sure I am voicing the opinion of bulk of the middle rung officers of the Army!

10. Please do publish our sheer disappointment with your esteemed newspaper for carrying such blasphemous articles! JAI HIND!

Nina Sachar
(Wife of Army Officer)

Forwarded by Brig PT Gangadharan (Retd)

Comments: The MOD needs to get the myths busted so that the general population actually get to know the quality and quantity/ quantum of perks that middle rung officers and Jawans of Defence Forces truly get on ground to what is entitled on paper. Is it possible for a corrupt bureaucratic system to deliver whatever perks are truly envisaged on paper? The defence forces personnel are fighting twin battles firstly the bureaucratic empire (including Red Tapism and corruption within and external) and secondly defending the Nation!