Acting tough against the unruly tent mafias in the national Capital, the Delhi Government’s Public Works Department (PWD) has begun booking them for fleecing the public. The department has lodged criminal cases against two tent mafias in the city for fraudulently booking the community centres and then letting them out at high prices. As per the existing rates, the community centres are available at a sum of Rs 2,000 to Rs 5,000 but the tent house owners secure illegal bookings in the name of Government officials and then provide them to clients at a princely sum. In majority of cases, they usually charge between Rs 50,000 to Rs 1 lakh depending on the location and demand of the venues.
This issue came to the notice of PWD a few months back and they worked out the modus operandi of the tent house. The story was really intriguing. One community centre at Gulabi Bagh was booked in the name of Vijay Kumar but during verification he denied about any ceremony being organised by him. Then the booking in his name was cancelled. The very next day, one Ravi Kumar of Railway Colony of Bulward Road surfaced to claim that Metro tent house had secured him this venue for his sister’s marriage. He provided the entire detail to PWD officials how he was made to pay a hefty amount for this booking and was beguiled by the tent house owner.
In another similar case, Ved Prakash was provided venue for his daughter’s marriage after securing a large sum of money. When the booking was cancelled, he came to know the whole illegal process adopted by the tent house owner. In fact, these tent house owners are hand-in-glove with Government officials to secure these booking of community centres and park that provides them huge money almost every day during the wedding season. There are four dozen community halls under the PWD.
Insiders say the tent houses book the venues in their own names at midnight as soon as the date changes to prevent the aam aadmi from making bookings. Even if a person manages to book the ground online, she will have to pay the tent house owner a “discounted” rate. “At the most, the tent house occupying the ground will give a token discount. Complaints to DDA, PWD, MCD or Delhi Police won’t yield anything. The tent houses invest crores of rupees every wedding season to get the land from the mafia. They are not going anywhere,” said insiders.
Delhi witnesses thousands of weddings in a day and the tent house owners in collusion with Government officials operate this business to mint easy money. Therefore, the PWD has lodged an FIR with the IP Estate police station where they are seeking action not only against tent house owners but also against those Government functionaries, who are mired in this racket.