MHADA defers lottery for mill workers

The government has decided not to conduct MHADA’s lottery for mill workers on May 30, acceding to the mill unions demand for verification of the applications.

There was suspicion among the union leaders that thousands of bogus applications may have been filed. According to the new schedule, the lottery will be held in September (on the occasion of Diwali).

Last week, the Maharashtra Housing and Area Development Authority (MHADA) held a meeting with the chief minister Prithviraj Chavan regarding the lottery. The official handling the lottery procedure informed the chief minister that there were several complications in the applications filed by the mill workers, and that MHADA was trying to solve these problems by appointing special officers who were manually separating the forms according to the mill codes on them. Many mill workers have also applied under different names.

MHADA is the nodal agency for the mill workers lottery, and the CM had directed the authority to conduct the lottery before May 31, since he had committed to the same in the last budget session. The state had therefore decided to not to allow fresh applications for the workers’ houses, and to conduct the lottery on the basis of forms already filled. But now the officials are realising it will be an uphill task to verify the documents.

According to the chief officer of the Mumbai Board, the mill-wise separation of the forms will take a month, and if verification is needed, then another two months.

Next week, another meeting will be held between MHADA, government officials and the mill workers’ unions. The exact date for the lottery will then be decided.