MUMBAI: The Supreme Court on Friday stayed a Bombay High Court order that had set up a six-member panel, headed by retired justice Gautam Patel, to recommend measures for curbing avoidable litigation generated by the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) and the consequent waste of public funds.
Senior advocate Girish Godbole informed a division bench of justice GS Kulkarni and justice Arif Doctor that the civic body had challenged the July 25 order in the apex court through a special leave petition, which was admitted and granted a stay.
The high court’s order had arisen from a clutch of petitions over multiple violations at an under-construction 10-storey building in Dadar West. Although the structure remains incomplete, with only its skeletal frame in place, 12 ground-floor shops have been operating as full-fledged businesses for over 12 years without civic approval.
Expressing disbelief that such “gross illegalities” in the heart of the city could escape notice, the high court observed that there had been a “total failure of municipal governance,” with officials up to the rank of additional commissioner “turning a blind eye” to the violations.
The bench ordered action under the law against the illegal occupants but also took aim at the larger pattern of BMC inaction, noting that this negligence was fuelling a massive volume of avoidable cases — making the corporation the largest litigant in Mumbai.
“Is it a good sign?,” the court asked, “that for years together the municipal corporation would keep generating and then defending hundreds of thousands of proceedings in every court in the city?” The judges remarked that civic officials were spending more time in legal matters than performing their primary duties, leading to a “colossal derailment” of municipal governance.
The court said the corporation’s failure to address such issues was resulting in “massive litigation being faced and defended at huge public cost and taxpayers’ money.” It stressed that advanced technology could make municipal administration more citizen-friendly, transparent and efficient, and that similar systemic changes were needed to reduce civic litigation.
Calling the situation “quite alarming,” the high court on July 25 had appointed the Patel-led committee — which also included senior advocate Naushad Engineer and four civic officials nominated by the municipal commissioner — to examine the scale, nature and origins of civic litigation across different wards and identify officers responsible for its generation.
That process will now remain on hold following the Supreme Court’s intervention.