Builder-bureaucrat-politician and Campa Colas
While the 100 odd families residing in Campa Cola House Building Society in Mumbai have got relief from the Supreme Court for six months, during which period they will not be asked to vacate the premise which has been declared illegal, they may well be on the streets if a lasting resolution does not come about. It is to be hoped that Attorney General GE Vahanvati, who has volunteered to find a ‘permanent solution' to the issue, succeeds in his endeavour. It is strange that the residents, who have paid due amounts, including property tax which the Government has collected against the flats they have been occupying all these years, should have been victimised for the sins of the builders who made constructions in violation to the rules, and for the callousness of the municipal and other Government authorities that allowed the irregularities to take place under their nose. When the residents move in after their receive the occupancy certificates, they do so under the impression that the builder concerned has complied with all the regulations — which is why he gets the necessary clearances from the authorities. In this case, it is obvious that the builder not only misled the residents but also got away with the illegalities because of his connivance with various State Government authorities. Since there is no reason why the residents must be made to pay the price, any permanent solution must factor the possibility that the existing construction can be legalised by following the rules of the law. The residents of Campa Cola society were close to eviction, and but for their robust protest and the attention their battle attracted from the media, perhaps their cause would have been a lost one. After all, the bulldozers had already broken open the main gates of the society and the police had arrived in full strength to quell the protests. The apex court stayed its own order of demolition, seeing the anger and the plight of the residents.
The Campa Cola incident raises the larger issue of the builder-bureaucrat-politician nexus that has allowed for brazen illegalities in real estate across the country. What else can explain how builders manage constructions that flout established rules and still get all the necessary clearances, based on which residents occupy the buildingIJ It's not just residents of housing societies that have to bear the brunt; even poor slum-dwellers are often left to fend for themselves. Slums too are illegal, but the decision-makers turn a blind eye to them because the residents form an important vote-bank for them. Slums are forever being ‘regularised' as a vote-catching tactic. Those that do not get regularised are one fine day razed to the ground. The haphazard and illegal constructions have turned into a major crisis in urban planning for growing towns and cities. The situation is going to worsen because an increasingly large number of people are migrating from villages to urban regions in search of a better life.
The ideal solution is, of course, not regularisation at a stage when the issue becomes critical, but for the authorities to ensure that buildings come up without being allowed to violate the law. Until that happens,we could well have many more Campa Cola-like incidents elsewhere in the country.