High Court orders demolition of illegal building, following a resident’s complaint.

A professional in service management shows the way for citizens forced to live in illegal buildings. Jaswinder Bansal not only refused to allow the ageing parents to inhabit their redeveloped apartment, constructed in a completely illegal building but also filed a lawsuit in the High Court of Bombay against the builders and the BMC. On 23 January, following HC’s involvement, demolition of the ground plus four-storey structure in Juhu Koliwada is scheduled to finally begin.

In Dindoshi, the BMC and the civil court which had issued a demolishing stay took action at the end of a rap from the division bench of Justice SJ Kathawalla and BP Colabawalla earlier this month and took appropriate steps to prepare a way for the demolition of the building. Interestingly, the rest of the tenants who took possession of their residences were given the stay order.

The HC was told by the BMC on January 21 that the police and the local police station had previously been asked for assistance to get the building down in three days, built by Jatin Babu Nair. Of the 17 apartments, 11-12 are occupied. But now all the owners will go to the court to recover money paid to the developer.

Bansal said he was forced to move the court by fear of the building collapse. “The builder cheated all of us, the foundation is hardly five feet deep,” he said, noting he understood a long battle to get his money back.

He said he was happy that the building would be demolished, but he was disappointed that no action had been ruled against the BMC K (West) officers and builder. “I continued to send complaints to the BMC, but there wasn’t concrete action. They were still defending the builder. I also met the additional commissioner of suburbs.”

Bansal filed a case on behalf of his mother with the Advocate Prasant Pandey representing him in court. The BMC acknowledged once before the HC that the building had no permissions but said it was helpless to do anything by citing a stay decree on demolition received from the Civil Court of the city of Dindoshi.

The builder admitted that he didn’t get any permits after which the division bench required the stay to be vacated in an order on January 7.