A Monument To Corruption

Law  | 18 November 2010  | print

So long as it stands, the Adarsh building is a monument to corruption, a symbol that the rule of law is a purchasable commodity

The Adarsh Society scam has many dimensions—illegal permissions, allotments, extra FSI, contraventions of the law, ownership of the land, and more. But there’s another scandal quietly brewing and it is possibly the worst of all. On the basis that, following the Ministry of Environment & Forests’ notice to the society asking it to show cause why it should not be demolished, some lobbies have recently suggested that the building should be “auctioned” (the auction proceeds to go to the state treasury).

The basis of this argument is that demolition is an expensive business — it is estimated to cost Rs.3 crores — and that a demolition is a national “loss”. That argument is completely bogus. It has been canvassed repeatedly in the law courts, and repeatedly rejected.

In the mid-1980’s, Arun Bhatia, then Collector of Bombay, exposed a series of FSI scams. A builder-architect-BMC nexus contrived to fudge plot areas and available FSI. A series of articles in the Indian Express exposed the scam. Based on those articles, Shyam Chainani and the Bombay Environmental Action Group filed petitions challenging these constructions. Two of the buildings involved are well known to Mumbai’s citizens: the empty Pratibha building, off Sophia College lane, and Arihant, opposite Cadbury House at Mahalaxmi. Arihant was demolished entirely—for many years it stood as a wreck till it was pulled down. Pratibha still stands, with its top eight floors rendered unusable. In both cases, the argument that builders now advance for Adarsh, was agitated in court. In the Pratibha case, the Supreme Court in 1992 refused to hold in favour of the society and stay further demolition, observing that illegal construction must be dealt with firmly because they are against the public interest.

Two years later, in 1994, the Bombay High Court decided the Arihant case. There, the “loss argument” was specifically raised. This is what the High Court said:

“Both the learned Counsel submitted that as the shell of the building has already been erected by the year 1984, the cancellation of the sanction granted by the Corporation would lead to financial loss. We are not at all impressed about the claim made about financial loss. It has repeatedly come to our notice that in the city of Bombay builders by joining hands with the officers of the Corporation openly flout every conceivable rule including Development Control Rules. The builders are under the impression that once the shell of the building is illegally constructed then the Court can be persuaded to take a sympathetic view and permit the construction even though in total breach of every legal provision. … The time has come when everyone should realize that the rule of law is not a purchasable commodity.”

These are the words of Justice Pendse and Justice Jhunjhunwala of the Bombay High Court in 1994. Sixteen years later, they seem strangely prescient; and we seem to have learned nothing at all. The illegalities the judges noted with such despair still continue. The arguments to allow the continuance of those illegalities are still made.

This is why the suggestion to “auction” Adarsh is so reprehensible. That building, which should have housed the veterans and families of our armed forces who fought and died in Kargil, is now a monument to corruption, one that has cost the state its Chief Minister. That is no small thing. To allow Adarsh to stand is, therefore, to accept the stench about it. There seems little chance of it being restored, legally, to its original purpose. That building, and the plot on which it stands, must now be put to a purpose that correctly reflects what we all feel, what has been achieved by the media and by the many citizens and groups who fought against it. As the judges in the Arihant case said, “it is only because of the continuous efforts of groups like the petitioners that illegalities are brought to the attention of the Court.”

Another space must be found for a building for Kargil veterans. The Adarsh building should be torn down. The cost of demolition is irrelevant, because it is the best investment of all, an investment in justice. The plot must be turned into a public park. In it, we need a memorial to those who fought and died in Kargil, a place to honour our valiant, a place of quiet and of reflection, one that sends a permanent message to everyone in every limb of government: no, you can’t get away with it; no, we won’t let you get away with it; and, no matter what you do, our city still believes that the rule of law is not for sale.