The Bombay high court recently rapped the Maharashtra Housing and Development Authority (MHADA) for issuing eviction notice to 55-year-old widow who has been residing in a 160 square feet tenement at Kalachowki since last 50 years.
A division bench of Justices GS Patel and SG Dige, last month, directed MHADA to add her name as a tenant/occupant observing it had a policy to “temporarily accommodate even trespassers” whereas, in this case, it was insisting on reserving its rights to evict an old woman, lawfully living in the premises.
“We have to ask: where is the justice in such an approach? If we were to accept MHADA’s stand, we would be lending authority to a manifest injustice,” observed the bench.
The HC was hearing a petition by Shashikala Yewale challenging the eviction notice issued by MHADA. Her advocate Harshal Mirashi said that she had made several representations before MHADA, the last one being on December 10, 2019 but received no response.
According to her plea, in 1960, the tenement belonged to one Raghunath Chavan who transferred the flat in her husband’s uncle’s name over thirty years ago. She started residing in the premises after her marriage in 1984. Later, in 1994, the uncle issued an affidavit and indemnity for the flat in favour of her husband, Kishan Yewale.
Interestingly, even MHADA had also recorded the couple’s possession of the flat. Kishan had filed two applications for transfer of flat in his name, but MHADA said they were short of certain documents.
Before the HC, the MHADA took a stand that it would consider the application.
The judges questioned the MHADA’s stand and how it has been inactive for 40-50 years and now wanted to evict the octogenarian who has been residing there since 5 decades.
“To allow this would be surely inequitable and unjust…,” noted the judges. They further added: “We refuse to allow ourselves to be a party to any such executive or administrative action.”
The bench even remarked that the authority had a policy of giving permanent alternate accommodation to even trespassers. “So on the one hand, MHADA rewards clear illegalities like trespass, but on the other wants to pursue eviction against bona fide occupiers whose possession is noted even on MHADA records and against whom MHADA has taken no action for 50 years,” it added.
Refraining from imposing cost on MHADA, the HC said: “But MHADA should not be so sanguine as to imagine that we will continue to show such restraint.”
The HC warned MHADA that it would, in future, impose cost which would be proportional to the extent of its disapproval. “Where, in future, we find MHADA — or any other authority — to have acted in so thoroughly an unreasonable manner against citizens and residents, we will express our disapproval by making an order of costs. And the amount of costs will indicate the extent of our disapproval,” said the judges.
The HC has directed MHADA to “forthwith update and amend its records to show Shashikala Kishan Yewale as the lawful tenant/occupant”.
