Unique ID for Bangalore property

By January 2011, all property owners of Bangalore will finally get their updated unique Property Identification (PID) numbers. The new PIDs will be a complete identity of your property — not just updating ward numbers. They will be ‘geo-tagged’ with the exact spacial dimensions of your property and have the latest photograph of your house. After January, one can access details on the BBMP website about any property in the city using the PIDs. Currently, only properties in core areas have PIDs — majority of them still have the old ward numbers and there’s no uniformity in digits. “We are now working on setting up a continuous updation process of these unique IDs. All PIDs in core areas will be updated with new ward numbers within the next 8-10 days. However, we are still working on other changes. Once updated, the PIDs can also be used for property registrations and even in bank transactions for loans. In later stages, the PIDs will also help in giving a scientific identity to streets,” a senior BBMP official said. Presently, the PIDs are all fixed at nine digits in three parts — ward number, street number and property number. The number of digits might be altered depending on field surveys that are being conducted now. The surveys for PID updation began last month and are expected to be completed by November-end.According to BBMP sources, there are two teams assigned per ward. Each team comprises engineers, a tax inspector and revenue inspector. These teams have been going around the ward, mapping properties and taking their photographs. With this, the property database for the city using Geo Information System (GIS) will also be ready by January. A total 13.87 lakh properties have been plotted on the GIS map till date and are now being verified and updated with other details based on these field surveys. A major problem of the Palike with tax collection has been the lack of tools to track property with accuracy. With GIS-based property survey finally reaching completion, it will now have access to a complete property database with details of dimensions, directions and land use. Even the number of floors in each building can be tracked.