MUMBAI: The Bombay High Court on Wednesday upheld the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation’s (BMC) decision to cancel a No Objection Certificate (NOC) granted for a slum rehabilitation project in Malad East. The court held that the civic body, as the land owner, has preferential rights in redevelopment matters.
In 2016, the Slum Rehabilitation Authority (SRA), gave a contract to Okhawala Shelter, Builders and Developers, for the redevelopment of slums in Malad East. The land where the new buildings were to be constructed belonged to the BMC and was allegedly reserved for a municipal ward office, disaster management facilities and a municipal chowky. Once the project proposals had been submitted, the SRA directed the developer to get an NOC from the BMC.
On December 31, 2021, the BMC gave the NOC to the developer on the condition that it will construct and hand over the BMC a municipal office, disaster management facility and a municipal chowky, and a building with a 4,705 sq.m area. The plans were then approved and the rehabilitation scheme began. In February 2022, as per the final proposal. 79 slum inhabitants were eligible for rehabilitation and 34 were not.
However, when the builder submitted its building plans to the BMC in January 2023, the civic body saw that its required conditions had not been fulfilled. Even after several meetings, the BMC claimed that the developer had failed to submit a revised plan.
The developer initially approached the Bombay High Court to settle the matter. However, the court asked the developer in 2023 to explain why the NOC should not be canceled. Eventually, the BMC did cancel the NOCs given for the project, stating that the civic body would carry out the construction itself and the costs and premium charges paid by the developer to the BMC would be refunded.
During the hearing, advocates Joel Carlos and Pushpa Yadav for BMC said the land in question belonged to the civic body and therefore they had a preferential right to take decisions about it. They added that the rights of slum dwellers who are “encroachers” cannot be put above the rights of the BMC.
Noting that the developer had not submitted any revised plans for over a year after the BMC’s objections, a division bench of justices GS Kulkarni and Aarti Sathe held that the NOC had been rightfully cancelled. “This, to our mind, shows the lackadaisical attitude on the part of the developer and therefore it would not lie in their mouth now to contend that they have complied with all the conditions of the NOC”, the court said.
The court noted the validity of the BMC’s order and said that there is no need for it to intervene. “We have no hesitation in holding that the developer had miserably failed to comply with the conditions of the NOC and the Letter of Intent (LOI). The cancellation is based on the correct findings, which are borne out by the record”, the court said, adding that it does not find any fault, legal or otherwise, to interfere with the civic body’s order.