CAMPA COLA RESIDENTS’ DEMAND ‘Can challenge BMC if it regularizes any other illegal bldg’

Mumbai: Going by the Supreme Court order directing the demolition of illegal portions of Campa Cola housing society, the civic body cannot regularize any other unauthorized structures in the city, residents of the Worli building have said. 

    According to the government data, at least 56,332 buildings in Mumbai are unauthorized. The residents said if the BMC tried to regularize any of those illegal structures, they could challenge it, citing the SC order. They have also requested the state to consider an ordinance that will eventually supersede the Supreme Court order. 
    The residents have recently submitted a legal opinion issued by Jhangiani Narula and Associates to chief minister Prithviraj Chavan, Congress MP Milind Deora and mayor Sunil Prabhu. The legal opinion by advocate Rajiv Narula says the SC order had substantially curtailed the BMC's powers to regularize the Campa Cola building. "In effect, all the other buildings where the construction has gone beyond the sanctioned plan will have to be pulled down as those cannot be regularized as per the SC judgment," the statement says. "All the unauthorized constructions in Maharashtra/Greater Mumbai... will be affected by the said judgment." 
    Residents in their letter to the CM and the mayor have said in the eventuality that their building is razed, consideration of any regularization proposal of any other building can be challenged. There will also be a drop in penalties that would otherwise be collected for regularization, they have said.