The Bombay High Court’s order to demolish the 31-storey Adarsh Housing Society complex marks a high point in this sensational case of abuse of power by the bureaucrats in the army and in the government of Maharashtra and the politicians. But what constitutes the scam remains unclear and even elusive. When the story broke out in 2010, the hue and cry revolved round the thesis that the housing complex was meant for the widows of Kargil war heroes, and that they were denied their due. Then Maharashtra Chief Minister Ashok Chavan had to resign because of the allegation that his family members got flats allocated in the complex. Names of other prominent politicians too did the rounds. The other major issue was whether the plot belonged to the Ministry of Defence (MoD) or to the local authorities. The ownership was contested. The High Court order says that after the demolition the plot should revert to the original state. It is an issue that needs to be settled as well. It became quite clear, as the scandal unfolded, that it was not meant for Kargil war widows.

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Interestingly, the central Ministry of Environment and Forest (MoEF) had ordered the demolition of the building because the society had not got environmental clearances. The Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA) had sought the demolition because the building complex had exceeded the restriction of 30 m height, and had reached 100 m. The Army had sought the demolition because the high-rise building is next to sensitive defence installations. The lawyer for the MoD had claimed that the demolition order was a victory for all the three. 

The case is however not settled because the high court has stayed its own order and gave the Adarsh Housing Society three week’s time to go in appeal to the Supreme Court. The text of the “reasoned judgment” is not yet in the public domain. So it will not be possible to know on what specific grounds the demolition order was based.

 It is however clear that whoever owns the plot, and whoever can or cannot belong to the housing society and lay claims to a flat, there has been a lot of hanky-panky in the allotment of flats. The middle rung officers in the defence establishment and their counterparts in the state government who had issued the necessary clearances in return for a flat or flats have worked in cahoots with each other to bend the law. That is why, the court had directed the state government as well as the army to identity the guilty officials and initiate proceedings against them. The positive fallout despite the hazy details of the Adarsh case is that the court has undone the wrongdoing, and it did not allow for the fait accompli factor. 

It is natural that what evoked public attention and public ire is the involvement of politicians in high office like Ashok Chavan and others. Though politicians need to be shamed for every act of corruption, the more crucial aspect is to understand the anatomy of corruption in each case. Unless all the persons involved at different stages are identified and punished, the chain of wrong-doing cannot be broken. It may not be a sufficient deterrent to punish the high-profile politician, in this case Chavan. 

The canker of corruption destroys the system from the inside. There is a need for systemic cleaning. That is why the details of how corruption functions in each case need to be recorded as a way to strengthen the system and make it immune to the tampering of the processes.