Pull down Adarsh: HC

Shiv Kumar

Tribune News Service

Mumbai, April 29

The Bombay High Court today ordered the demolition of the controversial Adarsh Co-operative Housing Society building at Colaba in Central Mumbai on the grounds that it violated the provisions of the Coastal Regulation Zone Act. The court, however, granted a stay on its order for 12 weeks to allow lawyers representing members of the Adarsh Society to challenge it in the Supreme Court.

A Bench comprising Justices RV More and RG Ketkar also asked the Ministry of Defence to act against its officials for not taking action on irregularities during the construction of the building. 

It asked all parties, including the Ministry of Defence and the state government, to restore the plot on which the Adarsh building stood.  

The Ministry of Environment and Forests had on January 16, 2011, ordered that  the building be demolished in three months. However, members of the society moved the Bombay High Court.

The Adarsh Co-operative Housing Society was originally planned as a six-storey building to house women who lost their men in the Kargil war. But in a few years, the building grew in height as politicians, bureaucrats and Army officers jostled for flats. 

The scam came to light in November 2010. The then Chief Minister Ashok Chavan had to resign after it was revealed that he had obtained multiple flats in the names of his relatives.