This fee is levied by the corporation in cases of transfer of property between parties. But the transfer of ownership in slums has been an income source the corporation simply hasn't tapped all these years, despite the appointment of colony officers for the purpose.

The administration also recently doubled the transfer fee. For residential purposes, the transfer fee now will be Rs 5,000 for 200 sq ft and extra Rs 100 for every additional 10 sq ft. For commercial purposes, the fee will be Rs 15,000 for 150 sq ft and additional Rs 500 for every additional square feet.

Ironically, although civic amenitiesare provided to all hutments till 1995, the transfer fee is charged from hutments till only 1985. Now, that policy is being reversed as the state government announced protection to all hutments till 1995, and the transfer fee will be now recovered from all.Civic amenities including electricity and water are provided to all slums till January 1, 1995, the cut-off date tabulated by the state government for providing free housing to slum dwellers under the Slum Redevelopment Authority (SRA) scheme. Deputy Mayor Gopal Shetty had also recently announced that the corporation should provide all, everybody in Mumbai, including those residing in unauthorised structures, should be provided drinking water by the corporation.

Implementation of this decision will be an uphill task, considering that the corporation doesn't have exact statistics on the number of huts which have changed hands. The estate dept is now carrying out surveys in slums to estimate the number of such hutments.

The department has taken up casesof transfer between 1976 and 1985. The chairperson in charge of buildings and estate department, Digambar Kandarkar, told Express Newsline that in the absence of data, the department is falling back on an average transfer of 10 per cent of residential huts and 15 per cent of commercial huts. Even if this is computed, the BMC will earn over Rs 10 crore.

``Once the revenue starts coming, we will increase our percentage of collection,'' assured Kandarkar. He has also ordered a survey of hutments between 1985 and 1995.