As two groups tussle over the ownership of the Kurla Christian cemetery, scrap dealers try to fish in troubled waters.
Even as two groups have locked in a ownership battle over the Kurla Christian cemetery, scrap dealers are trying to encroach on the graveyard space over the last six months. Metal girders and scrap dealers seen piling their stocks on the burial ground.
After their complaints with the local ward office of the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation and the Saki Naka police station have been largely ignored, the local community has approached the Maharashtra State Minorities Commission for help in solving the dispute.
The 500-square yards burial ground is used by poor families in the area who cannot afford funerals at the Sewree cemetery. The cemetery is managed by the Jari Mari Christian Cemetery Association that represents the estimated 7,000 families belonging to the 11 churches from the Baptist, Methodist, Church of North India and other Protestant denominations.
On an average four funerals take place at the ground every month. Due to shortage of space, graves are reused. “While middle-class families have funerals at Sewree, poor people come here since burial space is free,” said Joseph Pandit.
The association said that the ground was gifted to them in 1968 by the land’s owner, one Mariambai Kurlawala, who is also reported to have given away nearby plots of land for a Muslim cemetery. But another trust claims the land was donated to them in February 2009. The second trust has apparently leased the ground as storage space on a rental basis. In the past, the land was the subject matter of disputes at the City Civil court.
The association says it received permission to construct a wall around the cemetery, but the wall was broken down. “We cannot even clean the cemetery which looks like a scrap yard,” said DS Walters, a pastor at the Warner Memorial Methodist Church in New Mill Road Kurla which is part of the cemetery association.
Dr Abraham Mathai, vice-president of commission said, “There is a dispute over the ownership of the plot. I have spoken to the local MLA Naseem Khan about the problem. He has said that he will visit the cemetery after the assembly session is over.”
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