Hindustan Times: Mumbai:
Friday, May 24, 2013.
The civic
body has ‘lost’ files relating to a whopping 314 real estate projects, across
various stages of completion, in the lucrative Bandra to Andheri belt. The
files have gone missing from the building proposal department offices in these
areas, over the last seven years.
This
information was revealed by an RTI application filed by activist Sharad Yadav.
These swish
suburbs are home luxurious real estate projects, but the realty there is
infamous for violations and illegalities. HT had recently reported how areas
falling under the H West and K West wards (Bandra to Andheri) had the highest number of unauthorised
under-construction buildings.
According to
procedure, the-re is a dedicated file for each proposed building, with every
document related to it. The loss of such files means all the information on
these buildings has been erased from civic records.
According to
the Maharashtra Public Records Act, people resp-onsible for destroying or
removing public records can face impri-sonment or Rs10,000 fine, or both.
Utsal Karani,
secretary of NGO Janhit Manch said in most cases such disappearances of files
were deliberate attempts to hide illegalities. “After receiving the occupation
certificate, developers and architects often make illegal modifications to the
structure. They work in collusion with the lower-level staff, who make the
files ‘disappear.”
While Rajiv
Kuknur, chief engineer, development plan department, was unavailable for
comment, officials in the building proposals department (western suburbs) said,
“We have initiated the procedure for filing police complaints on the missing
files.”
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