High Court orders demolition of housing building

 The Bombay high court on Friday ordered the union environment ministry to demolish the controversial, 31-storeyed Adarsh, building, located in posh Cuffe Parade area.
The court endorsed the ministry's order, issued in 2011, to demolish the illegal building. However, members of the Adarsh Co-operative Housing Society approached the court, seeking a stay on the demolition.
The environment ministry had ordered the demolition of the building for violating the coastal regulations.
The court also ordered the government to initiate criminal prosecution against those accused of irregularities. It also wanted the open plot to be restored after the demolition of the building.
The high court also sought a probe into the role of politicians, including ministers, bureaucrats and defence officers in the multi-billion-rupee scam. It gave the state government 12 weeks to appeal to the Supreme Court.
The Adarsh housing society was floated to build a six-storeyed building to house the widows and dependents of soldiers and officers killed in the Kargil war. However, the promoters of the society roped in top politicians, bureaucrats and defence officers - by giving them or their relatives free flats - in a conspiracy that saw the violation of environmental and urban regulation norms.
They also changed the basic structure of the society, allowing civilians to become members. Four former chief ministers, several other ministers and top bureaucrats were nailed by a commission appointed by the Maharashtra government to probe the scam.
Former chief minister Ashok Chavan was sacked after it came to light that three of his relatives were given flats in the building, after he cleared some violations when he was a minister.
A two-member judicial commission appointed by the state government in 2010 indicted four former chief ministers - Chavan, the late Vilasrao Deshmukh, Sushilkumar Shinde and Shivajirao Nilangekar-Patil, for their role in extending concessions to the promoters of the illegal society.
Several high-profile government officials - including Devyani Khobragade, the controversial IFS officer, who was arrested in New York about three years ago for making false statements on a visa application for a maid servant - were illegally allotted flats in the building.
Besides the judicial commission, various other agencies have also probed the scam. They include the Enforcement Directorate (ED), the Income-Tax department and the Central Bureau of Investigation.
In fact, when the ED and CBI were dragging their feet while conducting the probe during the UPA regime (both in Delhi and Mumbai), the Bombay high court began monitoring the investigations. The CBI charge-sheeted 13 persons including Chavan and said they had been given flats in the building on a quid pro quo basis for favours granted to the promoters.
The former governor under the Congress-led government, however, refused to let the CBI prosecute Chavan, who is now a Lok Sabha MP from Nanded and president of the state unit of the Congress. But in February, the current governor gave the sanction to the CBI to prosecute the former chief minister. Cuffe Parade is one of Mumbai's poshest localities and apartments are sold for rates above Rs100,000 a sq ft.
nithin@khaleejtimes.com

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