UDF allegation: Subletting drains corporation income

Thiruvananthapuram: Subletting of shops at corporation-owned shopping complexes is tantamount to pilfering corporation’s income, according to UDF councillors. The Corporation does not allow subletting.  If the ownership of a shop needs to change hands, the shop keys have to be surrendered by the person who has taken it on lease. An auction has to be conducted before the keys can be handed over to a new owner. Instead of this, many have been resorting to subletting, according to UDF councillor Johnson Joseph. The licence would be in the name of one person, while the shop would be run by someone else, he says.

He also alleges that in some shopping complexes, rooms have been let out for leftist party offices to function. “In Sreekaryam shopping complex, CITU has a room,” he says.  The corporation has in the recent past identified a few cases of subletting. However most times, it goes unnoticed according to Deputy Mayor Rakhi Ravikumar. “They would lease it out to someone else. However, during the annual evaluation, the original owner would appear before the Corporation. So we would not know about subletting,” she said. The Corporation plans to do a detailed inquiry into such malpractices, she added.