By N.P.G Nair
Justice Sharukh Kathawalla, of Mumbai High Court decrees without any
reservations that Disha Constructions, the assigned builder of Datta Ramanand Housing Society, Vile Parle (East) can go ahead with the redevelopment work.
This is considered as a landmark judgment in Housing Society circles, since minority residents in any housing society has had hitherto the rights to get the programme held back or delayed indefinitely under one reason or other. In this typical case 75% of members were in favor and 25% against. And believe it or not this minority lobby could hold back the programme so long.
Now that is nullified with this judgment, the floodgates are open for all societies with dilapidated buildings to go in for redevelopment work once the  Society Management books the support of the majority of residents. In other words, the menace of high handedness  through non co-operation by minority (less than 25 %) is no more possible. In short, the prescribed 75% members consent agreement with any approved Builder or Developer can be forcefully implemented without much hardship or hindrance whatsoever.
In the Datta Ramanand Housing Scty.’s case, the developer had to wait a prolonged period of about three years from the date of the first redevelopment agreement and had to spend on heavy rent compensation since the last one year and had to deposit amounts for their alternative housing accommodation, as prescribed in the said legally-binding document. Further it is learnt that the said builder had to spend a sum of Rs.27 cr. to getting the required work done in this behalf. This was necessasited simply on account of a minority of 27 members out of 120, who were finally given a chance to sign the agreement with the Builder. Otherwise the Court receiver would have evicted them of their premises on the 3 In the suburbs of Mumbai, there are many such disturbing non-co operative movements organized by few society members in most of the societies. This has resulted in the continuation of dilapidated buildings in an as is where is condition. In other words the rest of the people, say majority of residents have no hope of getting into their dream homes in the immediate future.
Interestingly, there are quite a good number of Societies enthusiastic to go ahead with redevelopment; but alas! Decisions always stand in favor of the minority lobby resulting in all those shabby looking 4-story Buildings continuing their existence without even having the facility of a lift. Look, most of these residents who want to maintain status quo are Senior Citizens and they are prepared to surrender and sacrifice their future comfort of a semi-luxury apartment. They adopt a rigid attitude to live in the same accommodation and they are ignoring the fact that there is another generation behind them who wants to live in dignity and style. These old people with very narrow attitude always try to put the spoke in the wheel and eventually block the ambitions life style of their kith and kin.
Let us now get into a typical case. In one of the large societies in the western suburb of Mumbai, the procedure and processing of bidding the tender was completed successful. At the edge of finishing the last and final General meeting in which the Registrar was also informed to attend and witness the meeting, it was turned down due to non co-operation of very few members who spread the gossip that there were some vested interests in the redevelopment committee and forced the other members also not to participate rd October 2013, by implementation of by-laws. In the meeting. Look at the ultimate result of this entire non-cooperative attitude. The managing committee has to wait for another year to pass by to revive the issue. That means the residents have to continue living shabby buildings.
Let us compliment our government, for it has provided almost 2.7 and 4 ratio per 1 FSI in the suburbs and the city respectively. This enables the developer extend at least 50% or more of the tenants existing occupied premises without incurring any extra expenditure from the members. On the other hand, generally each occupant member will be given Corpus Fund by the Developer @ Rs.2500/- per sq.ft and above and this covers up the entire security of extra maintenance on account of Lift, and other facilities provided by the Builder. Finally, this decree from the High Court is a silver bullet. It removes the paralysis that has been holding back the housing societies wanting to go for redevelopment with one master stroke.
Look, your dream home is not far off. It is within your reach.