HC stays coastal authority's notice to Worli high-rise

Mumbai: An under-construction high-rise at Worli Seaface, the Sea Green housing society that had come under the scanner over alleged Adarsh-like violations for not obtaining CRZ approval and consuming extra FSI, has won reprieve from the Bombay high court. 

    A division bench of Chief Justice Mohit Shah and Justice M S Sanklecha in an interim order last week stayed the implementation of the Maharashtra Coastal Zone Management Authority’s (MCZMA) stopwork notice on the redevelopment project. Hearing a petition filed by the society’s original 18 residents who have been staying in temporary accommodation since the building was pulled down in 2007, the judges, however, clarified that any application for granting occupation certificate for the building will not be considered by the BMC till further orders. 
    The court noted that the building was constructed after BMC had sanctioned the plans in 2006. “The entire building has been substantially reconstructed; and the members of the society are living in temporary alternative accommodation for the last seven years,” the court said, adding, “the interests of justice would be served if the operation and implementation of the stopwork notice is stayed in order to enable the petitioner society to complete the balance construction and the finishing work.” The court listed the matter for final hearing on June 16, 2014. 
    Sea Green originally had 18 flats. Its redevelopment plans underwent three changes before the BMC sanctioned it in 2006. A year later the residents moved out and the building was pulled down to make way for a 14-storey highrise. The MCZMA in 2011 issued stop-work notices saying the project did not have Coastal Regulation Zone nod. The reason was while the building plans were sanctioned on the basis of Development Control norms of 1989, a Supreme Court order had held that for projects like Sea Green the applicable DCR was of 1967. 
    In its affidavit, the BMC said that the excess area was counted and the building had consumed only the permissible FSI of 1.33. The residents in the plea to the high court said that construction of the high-rise building was almost 95% complete. They further claimed that “the society and its members will continue to suffer irreparable hardship as the existing construction would remain open to weather causing damage to the construction work, which position will be irreversible”.

RELIEF: Sea Green society at Worli Seaface