Respond to initial probe report in Malad building crash: Bombay HC to BMC, state govt – Times of India

MUMBAI: Bombay high court on Tuesday sought BMC and the State government’s responses to a preliminary report of a judicial inquiry into the building collapse in Malwani. Malad (west) that killed 12 persons including 8 children.
“There was an old one-storey structure. The owner got changed. Thereafter he raised three more storeys. This raising of three storeys was without any permission of the Corporation or any other planning authority,” a bench of chief justice Dipankar Datta and justice Girish Kulkarni summarised the findings.
On June 11, 2021 the court directed judicial inquiry and appointed justice (retd) J P Deodhar as commissioner of inquiry. It sought a preliminary report from him. The terms of reference of the inquiry included whether the owner/ person responsible for its construction of the building obtained a sanctioned plan from appropriate planning authority or any competent authority before constructing it and whether action was taken for violations. Also, on whom can responsibility be fixed, who were statutorily responsible, to maintain vigil and supervision of illegal structures in the area and “ how many other buildings/structures in the area are illegal/unauthorised.”
The judges said the commissioner has “answered all our questions and given in depth recommendations.” He has also fixed responsibility but before the court passed any direction to take action against responsible persons, it would hear BMC and the state. “There is a protection given to encroachers by the government. Because of this protection to encroachers on public land, there is a confusion on which is the authority to take action. Whether it is Corporation or government. Therefore somebody has to take responsibility,” said the CJ.
The judges said the commissioner has recommendations in his report including for a separate authority for illegal encroachments. “Look at the observations of what the corporation and state government was doing in the report Blame game is not going to help. You can’t let people die like that,” said Justice Kulkarni. The judges asked BMC and state to inform which part of the commissioner’s recommendations are acceptable to them. “If they are acceptable to us, we’ll direct immediate implementation of the recommendations,’ the CJ added. The judges also mentioned that “there are more than 8000 structures in that particular western suburb and now how many are unauthorised is yet to be ascertained.”
The judges sought the responses on Friday when the court will specially sit to hear the matter. “Monsoon is setting in. We don’t want any (sic) other casualties,” said the CJ.