Latest laws Helping good people to do good things.June 21,2017
State Government has till now approved membership of 39 sitting Judges.
The Maharashtra govt. has allotted a prime plot of land in Mumbai for a proposed high-rise housing society of sitting judges of Bombay High Court.
Documents accessed under the Right to Information(RTI) Act show that before sanctioning the plot of land in Oshiwara, the state govt. eased norms for allotment of individual flats in such cases.
CM Fadnavis, when contacted, said that “Everything’s done strictly in accordance with the law.”
According to the info. obtained from the state housing dept. & the Maharashtra Housing & Area Development Authority (MHADA), CM Devendra Fadnavis on 31st August 2015, sanctioned the housing scheme for sitting Bombay High Court judges on a 32,300 sq. feet land parcel in Oshiwara, following a formal request by the proposed judges’ housing society which is now registered as Surabhi CHS Ltd (proposed).
On offer”ll be 84 homes, each of 1,076 sq ft carpet area on ownership basis to the society’s members. Construction of the high-rise is yet to start.
The housing scheme is sanctioned under regulation 13 (2) of Maharashtra Housing & Area Development (Estate Managements, Sale, Transfer and Exchange of Tenements), Regulations, 1981, a provision which was last used 9 years ago.
This regulation permits MHADA to build homes for a specific category of persons with the govt’s prior sanction.
Earlier, in year 2008, the Congress-led govt. used this provision for a housing scheme for bureaucrats.
On 12th August 2015, few days before the concerned judges’ society was sanctioned, the state modified certain norms & processes which were meant for deciding eligibility of individual members in housing schemes for Supreme Court & High Court judges.
It stated that the “issuance of public notice/advertisement for inviting applications & taking recourse of lottery system for allotment of individual flats wouldn’t be necessary for serving Supreme Court & High Court judges, since these’re constitutional posts.”
On April 25, 2011, the state had made it mandatory for MHADA to issue public notices for such housing schemes & Applications received were to be scrutinised for confirming eligibility of the proposed members.
A key norm is that a person is disqualified if he/she or his/her immediate family already owns a plot or a flat in Mumbai.
Then, eventual beneficiaries are to be selected through a draw of lots. In August 2015, the housing dept. issued a govt. resolution relaxing these conditions for sitting judges of Apex Court & High Court.
N L Jamadar, Maharashtra’s Principal Secretary (Law and Judiciary), whose opinion was sought on the subject of relaxing norms for membership to housing societies of judges, said that the govt. is within its powers to sanction a housing scheme for the judges. Such societies for judicial officers’ve been sanctioned in the past as well.
The office ofthe Bombay High Court Chief Justice Manjula Chellur declined comment.
With inputs from Indian Express