Kalyan-Dombivli illegal building scam assumes horrific proportions

The much talked about Kalyan-Dombivli illegal building scam assumed horrific proportions yesterday when it was revealed that the total number of buildings affected by the scam numbered 1500 and was only destined to go up once the investigations were concluded.

The very fact that more than 1500 buildings were illegally constructed shows the involvement of powerful people right from local MLA\’s to Corporators to underworld to Collectors to Gram panchayat right up to the tehsildar and talati levels.

This is an almost unimaginable scam and possibly the largest in the history of this country and was possibly going on since a few decades if not more.

It is also now emerging that the entire construction was financed by the underworld.
The gangsters involved belong to the Ravi Pujari and Chhota Rajan gangs helped by 2 local MLA\’s.

The total villages involved number more than 40.Some of them are Nandivli, Dawadi, Bhopar, Govali and Azade.The Sarpanch and Upsarpanch played a key role in this scam.

The police has registered 11 FIR\’s in the Manpada police station against 33 individuals.Most of them are \’builders\’. Their names are …..

• Mrityunjay Munni Singh (48),
• Vishal Mrityunjay Singh (22),
• Sunil Baban Gawade (45),
• Sunil Gopal Bodare (35),
• Satyawan Ganpat Kadam (59),
• Ajay Shivram Kolte (42)
• Dheeraj Mhatre.
• Two of the accused – Amit Kumar Singh and Samir Virani – are absconding.
  Two other builders, who are absconding, are related to local MLAs.

Main Conspirators

The police are saying that a NCP leader from Thane and a Navi Mumbai based state Minister are exerting pressure on them to go slow in the case and spare the political people involved in the case.

The police is now revealing how every department they went to for verification of the documents turned them down or refused to give them any information.
It was ultimately an RTI application filed with the district collectors office which replied after 4 months that no Non Agricultural certificates were issued to anyone in that area for the past 4 years !!!

The companies against whom FIR\’s have been registered are…

• Sandeep Bharat Mhatre (Siddhi Vinayak Corporation)
• Ravindra K Mhatre (Saiees Construction)
• Santosh Dubey and Nitendra Dubey (Goodwill Construction)
• Amit Kumar Singh (Vinayak Construction)
• Vishal Singh and Shivraj Singh (Shiv Kala Construction)
• The architects of the buildings.

Overall, 27 villages in Dombivli and 13 in Kalyan have been engulfed by the scam.

This is by far the biggest ever housing scam in the Country so far.

The pictures of the main conspirators are given above.

Builder sells same flat to 2 people,absconding.

A builder by the name of Shirish Rangrao Chavan (age 38) (Suraj Enterprises) is absconding after a case of cheating was registered against him by Prakash Raut at the Kalamboli police station.
The builder sold a flat in his building Suraj Apartment on plot no 90 at Sector 34, Kamothe to Prakash Raut. Later he found out that the flat was already sold to someone else in July 2011.
The builder Shirish Chavan is absconding and his phone switched off. Two other people also claimed to have been cheated by the builder in the same way. In all,3 flats were sold to 6 people.
This scam is growing by the day as more than 150 people are reportedly affected by the scam. In all cases, the builder took between 2 and 5 lakhs from each buyer and finally sold his plot to another person and absconded.

UPDATE 19,JULY,2012

Mr.Shirish Chavan has been arrested by the Kalamboli police for cheating approx 100 people who had invested in his projects in Panvel, Kamothe and Kalamboli. He was arrested from his native place in Kolhapur.
A team of the Kalamboli Police went to Kolhapur to arrest him.

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Builder fined for delaying flat posession

The Maharashtra State Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission (Consumer Court) has asked M/S Vaidehi Akash Housing Pvt limited,to pay the expenses of stamp-duty,registration and conveyance for a 1000 sq ft flat located on Veera Desai Road(Andheri West).The builder had not handed over the flat to the buyer even seven years after making the full payment of 22 lakhs.The commission also told the builder to handover the flat within 45 days or else he will have to pay another 5 lakhs as interest.
The builder had issued an allotment letter dated March 22,2005  but did not execute the sale agreement for the 22 lakhs paid to him.Despite repeated summons,the company and its directors failed to appear before it.The commission then passed an exparte order against them.
Most people are unaware that they can pursue the builder for any problems in the consumer court and that the law is almost always on their side.Problems such as delayed conveyance,delayed society formation etc etc can be pursued in the Consumer Court and does not  require a lawyer.Just a plain paper submission is ok.

Mhada cancels allotment of 39 prime plots in Mumbai

The Mhada vice-president and CEO, Mr.Satish Gavai announced on tuesday,19th June 2012,that Mhada had cancelled allotments of 39 prime plots which were given to \’prominent personalities\’ and \’trusts\’. In most of the cases these \’prominent personalities and trusts\’ were nothing more than front companies for politicians and their families. The regulation under which they were \’distributed\’ was the Regulation 16 of Mhada act. Most of these \’allotments\’ were under the watch of Vilasrao Deshmukh and Sushil Kumar Shinde (ex-cm\’s of Maharashtra).
Most of these plots were reserved for affordable housing or schools and hospitals to charitable trusts. The politicians in control amended the rules to engineer this scam.
68 plots spread over 20 hectares of land were allotted at a negligible rate by a sub-committee of Congress and NCP ministers. Deshmukh sanctioned 52 and Shinde sanctioned 15.All the beneficiaries were politicians, builders, bureaucrats, housing societies and trusts controlled by Congress and NCP ministers.
This allotment of public housing plots was stopped in April 2004.
39 cases are still pending.
In one such case a 10,000 sq mtr plot in Oshiwara was meant for a hospital but was given to Nargis Dutt Trust. After it was sanctioned the land in 2000,the trust wanted to pay just Rs.1 (one) per year for a 99 year lease !!
The allotment was made for Rs.21 crores in 2007 which was subsequently reduced to 11 crores. The best part is that the trust has not yet paid its dues. The Trustee of this trust is none other than Congress MP Priya Dutt.
A CAG report of 2009 slammed the deal saying it was engineered to benefit the \’trust\’.
Other such plots were allotted to educational bodies controlled by Congress and NCP ministers. Some of them are…

• Rahebar Foundation (NCP MLA Nawab Malik\’s wife and sister are trustees)
• Raigad Military school (Congress MLA Madhukar Chavan).
• Kasegaon education society (Cabinet Minister Jayant Patil).Incidentally ,Malik and Patil were part of the Sub-committee that devised this entire policy and changed the rules, while Chavan was the chairman of Mhada.

The MP Mitra Charitable trust was allotted 6032 sq mtr plot in Goregaon for just Rs.40 lakh to build a school and playground but the trust divided the land into two and subleased it to 2 private firms that went on to construct on the portion meant for the playground of the school. Later it was revealed that the trust earns Rs.2.5 crore as annual rent from just one of the plots subleased to a school. Mhada now intends to seize such plots and create a land bank for affordable housing scheme for the masses. It will also buy land from private owners at Ready reckoner prices. Ready reckoner is the govt valuation of real estate in a particular area. It changes every year. Property taxes are also charged based on this.
All such allotted plots will now stand cancelled if the lease deed has not been executed by the trust with Mhada.

High Court cautions flat buyers to check papers before buying

The High court of Mumbai warned flat purchasers to verify all documentation and legal papers of real estate projects before putting money in them. They said this while disposing off the petition of the flat purchasers in the infamous \’Green Heritage\’ building in Kharghar. The petitioners wanted the High Court to regularize the illegal constructions. The High Court told the petitioners that the flat buyers should not blindly trust the brochures and catalogues of the builders but verify the legality with the various planning agencies like CIDCO etc.
The court said that the safety and greater good of the society cannot be put on stake for a few people.
The Green Heritage project is an example of just one case of blatant violations of building norms by the builder with active connivance of the CIDCO officials along with Police and other staff. The Green Heritage scam has been recently issued demolition orders of the top 3 floors.
The litigants have a choice of appealing the decision in the Supreme Court.