Thane: After a complaint was filed on March 7 at a Thane police station about an unauthorised bhoomipujan for a compound wall to enclose a disputed plot of land on Pokhran Road, local residents, including young people who use the ground to play, held a protest on Sunday to demand that the plot should be declared as a playground.
Earlier this month, a complaint was filed by a priest and members of the Our Lady of Mercy Church, which has claimed the land and has filed petitions and applications in the Bombay High Court, Thane Civil Court, and other judicial forums, claiming the plot.
The church tryst has said that the plot belonged to them because it was historically a part of the centuries-old ruins of a Portuguese-era structure, also called Our Lady of Mercy church.
On Sunday, members of the Thane Save Playground Committee and Thane Citizens Foundation gathered at the ground to demand that the Thane Municipal Corporation (TMC) should officially declare it a playground. The group demanded the land should be surveyed and demarcated with a compound wall.
The plot is reserved as a playground in the Thane city Development Plan but had been sold in 2007 by another church trust to a prominent builder for Rs 20 crores.
The sale had been challenged in the office of the Charity Commissioner and the Bombay High Court by some members of Our Lady of Mercy church. The cases are still pending and the petitioners want a status quo on the plot till the matter is settled by the courts.
The petitioners have said that the land cannot be reserved as a playground since there is a dispute. The construction company that bought the plot has handed over the plot to the TMC in return for the Transfer of Development Rights (TDR) for another project in the city.
The protestors, on the other hand, have said that citizens will not allow any public-private partnership agreement, and that the land should be made available for students and local athletes.
They have said that they will work out a plan of action to see that all citizens get to use the ground. But the petitioners in the case have said that the church plot is disputed and the matter is sub-judice in various courts including the High Court and Upalokayukta. The bhoomipoojan ceremony for the playground is illegal, they have said.
