SETBACK FOR RESIDENTS OF BANGUR NAGAR HC dismisses plea against shifting of recreation ground

Mumbai: There was no reprieve for residents of Bangur Nagar in Goregaon who had opposed the BMC's decision to shift a six-acre recreation ground abutting the Link Road to another location in the neighbourhood, while allowing the original ground to be commercially exploited for constructing residential buildings. The Bombay high court dismissed a PIL filed by Bangur Nagar Youth Welfare Association challenging the corporation's 1999 decision. 

    "We find no fault in the amendment to the Bangur Nagar layout plan in the year 1999, which 
is challenged by the petitioners in the present PIL," said a division bench of Chief Justice Mohit Shah and Justice M S Sanklecha. "Besides, one cannot lose sight of the fact that the amendment to the plan was made in 1999 and the petitioners have filed this PIL only in the year 2012. This delay itself would be fatal to the petitioners (a PIL filed in 2009 was withdrawn in 2011)," added the judges. 
    The Bangur Nagar colony is spread over a sprawling 5 lakh sq mof land in Goregaon (W) and today houses 167 residential buildings, seven commercial buildings, two schools and four temples. The dispute was over a plot of land, which was reserved for a recreation ground in the original layout of the colony. In 1999, the BMC allowed the recreation ground to be shifted to three different plots, and the existing ground be used to construct residential buildings. The petition claimed that this was against the rules and said the three plots now earmarked as recreation grounds was in mangrove plots and therefore, fell within the Coastal Regulation Zone norms. 
    The BMC opposed the PIL saying that the shifting of the recreation ground was as per rules and the three plots now designated as recreation grounds would not be subject to CRZ norms as it was approved before the rules were enacted. Laxmi Asbestos that developed the plots said that each of the plots in the colony had been provided with 15% recreation ground area. Further, though the rules required that the recreation ground earmarked for the entire layout should be over 49,921 sq m, it has actually provided 52,439 sq mof area for ground. 
    The court held that it did not find any prohibition for shifting the recreation ground in order to commercially exploit the existing ground.