By Soudhriti Bhabani
Kolkata, May 5 (IANS) Well-earning young professionals with a grungy lifestyle and seeking a place to unwind would soon be able to own a studio apartment in this eastern metropolis. Studio apartment, also called Efficiency apartment or Bachelor-style apartment, combines a living room, bedroom and kitchenette into a single unit. They are dime a dozen for hire but none to own in this metropolis.

India’s first ownership studio apartment is coming up in Kolkata’s Rajarhat township to cater to the lifestyle needs of the young seeking a place of their own outside the family where they can adventurously dump themselves - and at a modest monthly instalment.

Xanadu, from real estate giant Siddha group, is an upcoming studio apartment project with state-of-the-art furnishing.

Located in Rajarhat, the showpiece township of the West Bengal government to attract investment as an extension to IT hub Salt Lake Section V, the project would have 314 studio apartments, each with around 600 sq-ft space.

“Priced between Rs1.5 and 2 million, Xanadu will have everything from a fitness centre to SOHO (Small Office/Home Office), Chill-n-fill zone launderette, electronic access, landscape greens, lounge, swimming pool, cafeteria and a 24-hour concierge et al,” Sanjay Jain, Siddha joint managing director, told IANS.

“People will live a different lifestyle here. They can be fancy-free and be themselves,” he said.

“Xanadu is a Rs.1 billion project and one of the four we are doing in Rajarhat. We think this township is the future of Kolkata,” said Jain.

Like Xanadu, the summer capital of Kublai Khan’s Mongol Empire made famous by Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s eponymous poem, the studio apartment building is eyeing young and trendy Indian professionals with a happening private life as well as NRBs (Non-Resident Bengalis) who want to own a property back home.

“We are selling a concept for the first time in India. Studio apartments are not for buying yet in the country.

“We will also help rent out the apartments. So NRIs or young professionals buying these apartments can pay off their EMIs through rent,” said Jain.

“You don’t have ownership studio apartments in Mumbai or Bangalore. Now Kolkata will show the way,” said Siddharth Sethia, another Siddha joint managing director.

While in cities like New York, a studio apartment is the ‘L-shaped’ or ‘alcove’, studio in which the central room branches off into a small alcove that can be used for sleeping or dining, in Singapore, the apartments are built for the senior citizen as well as young working singles.