Day 3: 9,457 apply online for Mhada flats

After the initial hiccups, online applications to win a chance to buy a state-built affordable flat jumped to 9,457 on Friday. Naresh Kamath reports.

After the initial hiccups, online applications to win a chance to buy a state-built affordable flat jumped to 9,457 on Friday.

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On Wednesday, when the state housing board had started accepting online applications for the 4,034 flats it put up on the block, it got only 898 applications as many could not access the website: https://lottery.mhada.maharashtra.gov.in.

The officials had then blamed the heavy online traffic for difficulty in accessing the website.

Rectifying the problem, the Maharashtra Housing and Area Development Authority (Mhada) has beefed up the servers to facilitate more net traffic and also provided links on its own website to the housing lottery website. In addition, links were also provided to the housing lottery website from various search engines.

Amarjit Singh Manhas, chairman, Mhada Mumbai board, said: “As it was the first time the online concept was introduced, there was some confusion on the first day. We also noticed that people were logging on to our Mhada website, which did not have any lottery details, and this added to the chaos. Now, we have provided a link on our website directing people to the lottery website.”

Mhada decided to accept online application this year because it was noticed that most of the forms were rejected either because they were incomplete or had errors. In 2010, 7,960 applications were rejected, while in 2009, 5,326 applications were turned down by Mhada.

Doing their bit, many politicians have started help centres in their respective areas to help applicants fill the online forms.

At these centres, the staff fill the online application forms for Mhada flats at no cost and give printouts to the applicants. “I am getting lot of response as a majority of the people are not net savvy,” said Krishna Hegde, legislator from Vile Parle.

In the four Mhada lotteries held in the last four years, a total of 8.28 lakh people had applied for the 8,182 affordable flats put on sale. This year, too, Mhada expects lakhs of applicants for the 4,034 flats put on the block.