Bengaluru: As the Karnataka Cabinet decided to pay TDR worth over Rs 3,000 crore for acquiring a portion of Bangalore Palace land, the episode has highlighted how successive governments dilly-dallied in honouring Independence-era agreements with the erstwhile Mysore royal family.
The U-turn came barely days after the Supreme Court reprimanded the Siddaramaiah administration for attempting to circumvent its orders in compensating the former royals.
Earlier, the government had introduced a bill and an ordinance to avoid paying Transferable Development Rights—allowing landowners or builders to construct over and above the permissible limit—to the Wadiyar family. On Thursday, the Karnataka Assembly passed the Bangalore Palace (Acquisition and Transfer) Bill, 2025.
“A democratically elected government has the right to do what it wishes but this seems very deliberately done wherein there is no cost actually to the taxpayer in terms of TDR issuance and a great public good will be done,” Yaduveer Krishnadatta Chamaraja Wadiyar, the custodian of the erstwhile royal family, told ThePrint.
The bone of contention is a 15 acre parcel of land—falling under the 472 acre Bengaluru palace grounds—which the government wants to acquire for road widening to decongest the metropolis, but does not want to pay the market value of Rs 3,000-plus crore, i.e., nearly Rs 200 crore per acre.
“We will not give TDR…for development works. By not giving such a big amount of money (Rs 3,014 crore), we will ensure that this is not a big injustice to the state treasury,” Karnataka minister H.K.Patil had said.
Deputy Chief Minister D.K.Shivakumar says that the government would need Rs 3 lakh crore if it pays for land acquisition to develop public infrastructure in Bengaluru.
The denial to offer TDRs has slighted the erstwhile royals given that various governments had wavered–and reneged–on their promises, forcing the tussle to be played out in courts across the country.
But the attempts to wipe out the royal heritage, members of the family allege, started as early as in the 1970s. Even their association in politics has seemingly failed to resolve the long-standing property disputes.
The case
The Wadiyars own several large parcels of land in Bengaluru, Mysuru and other parts of Karnataka. In Bengaluru itself, it owns 472 acre of land located in the middle of several high density corridors, including the road that leads to the new airport.
For years, real estate sharks have eyed this land, which remains largely protected even though some portions are currently being used for commercial activities.
On 21 November 1996, the Bangalore Palace (Acquisition and Transfer) Act was enacted and two years later, a similar act was brought in to acquire the Mysore palace.
In the case of Bangalore Palace grounds, the government that year fixed a price of a paltry Rs 11 crore for 472 acre, translating to Rs 2.70 lakh per acre. These prices, going by Bengaluru real estate trends, were unacceptable even at that time.
Though the government claims the erstwhile royals accepted Rs 11 crore in 1996, the Wadiyars deny this and instead sought legal recourse. In 1996, the scions approached the Karnataka High Court and then began a long legal battle that ended up in the apex court.
On 21 November 2014, the SC passed the order in favour of the ex-royals, stating that they “shall be given TDR for widening of the road as per TDR rules.”
In a related case, the Karnataka HC, too, passed an order 7 September 2016, directing the state “grant necessary clearance to the BBMP for widening the road and to issue TDR certificates to the land owners in terms of the order of the Supreme Court as per the existing TDR Rules”.
It had then expressed hope that widening of the road would be completed within a year.
But, the government approached the SC to modify its order, issued notifications and did everything possible to avoid issuing TDRs to the land owners.
“In 2014, the value of the TDR wasn’t anywhere near the value today,” said another member of the royal family.
But, successive governments were either unable to act or to resolve the issue even though the royals accepted the TDR terms and not a cash compensation, which, by law, they are entitled to.
“The government believes that it has already acquired the property in 1996 and are owners of the land. They think since this is the case, there is no question of giving compensation for that,” said another member of the erstwhile royal family.
Government inaction over the years resulted in property prices to soar from the earlier estimated Rs 2.70 lakh to over Rs 200 crore per acre today.
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‘Royal snub’
It’s not the first time that the erstwhile royal family have accused the state government of trying to usurp its rights. In August last year, the Siddaramaiah government enacted the Shree Chamundeshwari Kshetra Development Authority Act, dragging one of the most revered deities into the middle of the tussle with the former royals.
The Wadiyars contended that the shrine was a private property and that the government was trying to promote tourism in a place that was ecologically sensitive and had immense spiritual significance.
According to the erstwhile royals, the Chamundeshwari temple was enlisted as a private property in an agreement between the last Maharaja of Mysore, Jayachamarajendra Wadiyar, and the Government of India on 23 January 1950. This was further recognised by the government through its memo dated 28 October 1972.
Earlier this week, Pramoda Devi Wadiyar, said that the family being targeted was not a new phenomenon and referred to “vindictive attitude” without naming anyone. “This is not something happening now but for many years now,” she alleged.
In the book ‘Story of Integration of States’, former cabinet secretary V.P. Menon says that the integration of the erstwhile state of Mysore into the Indian union was “smooth and easy”.
On the insistence of then home minister Sardar Vallabhai Patel, Menon reached Mysore to decide on the privy purse (payments to the ruling families as part of their agreements to integrate with India) of the Maharaja of Mysore.
“Soon after, I went to Mysore and had a three days’ discussion with the Maharajah and his ministers, in the course of which we settled the Maharajah’s privy purse, the matter of his private properties, his allowances as Rajpramukh and other details. The decisions reached were given effect to subsequently by an agreement between the Maharajah and the Government of India,” Menon writes.
‘Raja Pramukh’
Between 1947 and 1949, the Maharaja of Mysore continued to rule over his kingdom as sovereign ruler until the Indian Constitution came into force.
“By a proclamation of 29 October 1947, the Maharajah had set up a Constituent Assembly to frame a constitution for the State; this Constituent Assembly passed a resolution recommending that the constitution framed by the Constituent Assembly of the Indian Union should be adopted by Mysore. Effect was given to this by a proclamation issued by the Maharajah on 25 November 1949,” Menon writes.
Jayachamarajendra remained the ‘Raja Pramukh’ but this title was stripped in the 1956 reorganisation of states. He was elected first governor of Karnataka that year until 1964. He then served as the Madras governor for another two years.
However, unable to remain in politics, Jayachamarajendra gave up all positions and even refused to attend Dasara celebrations in Mysore.
“He completely stopped celebrating Dasara from 1969. He kept his sword on the throne and used to stay in Bandipur. His son, 20-year-old Srikantadatta Narasimharaja Wadiyar, conducted all the rituals,” the second ex-royal told ThePrint.
After Jayachamarajendra’s death in 1974, the government acquired several properties, especially temples. Srikantadatta then entered politics in 1984, representing Mysore in 1989, 1996 and 1999. No other family member entered politics until 2024 when his son Yaduveer won on a BJP ticket from the Mysore-Kodagu parliamentary seat.
The contributions of the Wadiyars are widely acknowledged as among the major factors why southern Karnataka is among the most culturally, educationally and economically well off regions in the state and the country.
“Generally whichever party, when they are in opposition, the way they speak to us, they empathise with us and say that justice will be served. But when they come to power, it’s not the same,” the second ex-royal told ThePrint.
Three generations of Wadiyars, this member said, are now entangled in litigation. “All we can hope is that we don’t pass this to our children.”
(Edited by Tony Rai)
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