BMC chief’s office would bear the brunt of every single misappropriation that has allowed illegal construction on ‘private’ forest land.
MUMBAi: More sinned than sinning: the epithet seems to fit municipal commissioner Jairaj Phatak to the T. He might not be the villain himself, but would be facing the music. Blame it on his position.
The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) chief’s office would bear the brunt of every single misappropriation that has allowed illegal construction on ‘private’ forest land. Reason: both building proposal and development plan departments, which alone can issue development permissions, are directly handled by the municipal commissioner’s office. To cap it all, the civic chief is the ratifying authority.
Following the Bombay High Court verdict on Monday, the civic circle was abuzz with the following queries: Whether all original land records and property cards were screened properly before giving developers the go-ahead for construction? Whether the opinion of forest officials were sought in this regard?
Ashok Shintre, chief engineer, building proposal department, said that development permissions were issued in accordance to the law, after verifying that the land was not in the reserved forest zone. “We have also referred to the declaration made by forest officials. To the best of my knowledge, permissions have only been issued on free leasehold properties.”
However, a senior civic official, on condition of anonymity, admitted that permission had been given for the construction of a shopping mall, even though land records had suggested that a part of the plot was reserved as forest land.
Phatak said that he had not got a copy of the order. However, he assured that if it was found that civic officials had indeed allowed illegal development on forest land, then the guilty would be taken to task. Soon, the BMC chief would be meeting officials from the building proposal department to take a stock of the situation.
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