Businessmen in the capital are just about waking to the host of business opportunities that the Delhi Metro is throwing up, most of them in real estate.

They can, for instance, acquire commercial space for a monthly rent of Rs 41 per square foot at the Delhi Metro's station at Shahdara. That's relatively inexpensive -- the very same space will cost six to seven times that sum once the Metro criss-crosses the entire capital.

Right now only the first stretch of the Metro, from Shahdara to Kashmere Gate, is functional.

Companies can also grab the opportunity of advertising their products in running trains, something that advertising agency Clear Channel is doing for some companies.

And, of course, the Metro will inevitably alter some of the capital's landscape.

All this is the outcome of the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation's decision to build office and commercial space on the Metro's stations and lease it out.  A McDonalds at the Kashmere Gate station, which came up two years ago, was the first lessee and has signed a 12-year lease agreement. Lot of other eating places now dot the station.

When the Cabinet cleared the Delhi Metro project in 1994-95, it imposed a rider  -- six per cent of the project cost would have to be met by the developing property. Real estate prices were booming in the early 1990s in the capital and DMRC officials did not then know that they had an uphill task ahead of them. The property market slumped in 1996 and the slump persisted for the next few years.

Compounding problems for DMRC, land that had been promised to it through inter-departmental transfers hardly came through. When land was allotted, it would generally be in a residential area where commercial use was prohibited.

Some lands were allotted in green and fishery areas and so on could not be developed.

What is more, a good chunk of the Metro runs through the low-income trans-Yamuna area. So even though we have an Amul outlet and ATMs of Canara Bank and Corporation Bank at each of the stations along the first metro corridor in the capital, the big corporate boys are waiting for the Metro to be up and running in the heart of New Delhi before they invest in acquiring space.

Still, DMRC realises that it can strike pay dirt. All office and commercial space at the stations in the trans-Yamuna area was built by the corporation on its own. But it's now engaging developers for construction work.

Private developers are falling over one another to grab the orders.

Infrastructures suggested that an information technology park be set up on six hectares of land. The Delhi Urban Arts Commission has cleared a plan to put up three buildings on the site with an office space of 90,000 square metres, prepared by Chennai-based architects Chakrapani.

The contract for constructing the first block will soon be awarded to one of three shortlisted bidders, which submitted the best tender.

The Delhi government is processing an application to grant special economic zone status to the project. If this comes through, the resultant duty and customs waiver will benefit DMRC as well as companies that set up shop in the IT park. 

A 15-hectare children's park was supposed to be put up but the Central Water Commission and the Yamuna standing committee did not allow the park to come up in the river bed area.

Other projects are in the pipeline too. At the Khyber Pass depot, which is close to Delhi University's north campus, MGF Developments Ltd has been signed to develop commercial space, which includes a cineplex and shopping malls.

MGF made a healthy upfront payment to DMRC and the agreement envisages an annual rent, which will increase by 20 per cent every three years. In addition, DMRC will receive a 5 per cent commission on shops that are taken up for possession at the mall.

For all of DMRC's efforts to enter the property market, however, it looks like it will be able to earn just 60 per cent of the Rs 500 crore (Rs 5 billion) that it has to raise by 2005 by developing its property.

For the capital's real estate slump has not hit a trough as yet. But what DMRC will unquestionably do is change a bit of Delhi's face forever.

The two million square feet of land for mixed use and development for retail, office and housing purposes along the Metro route, is expected to witness great demand.