MUMBAI: Poonam Chaurasiya, 29, sold her jewelry and took loans from her relatives to buy a one BHK flat at Jai Ambe Welfare Society in Agarwal Nagar in east Nalasopara. Purchased about 20 years ago, the flat rate price ₹5.5 million. “We were delighted to own a house, but now we are having sleepless nights,” said a distraught Chaurasiya, who spent years repaying his loans. “We won’t even have money to rent a house if we lose this apartment.”

Vegetable seller Navin Chauhan, 41, who resides in Shiv Darshan building in the same locality, wins ₹300 per day. He bought the 450 square foot house 12 years ago for ₹8 million. “If I lose this house, my family and I will have to sleep on the streets,” he said. “Most of my income is spent on my family’s daily needs: where can I find money for rent or deposit? »

Like Chaurasiya and Chauhan, around 8,000 other residents of the 41 unauthorized buildings of the Jai Ambe Welfare Society are living in anxiety as the Vasai-Virar Municipal Corporation (VVMC) has decided to carry out demolition of the illegal buildings this week. However, due to the electoral code of conduct, the civic body had to seek permission from the Election Commission on Tuesday to carry out the demolition.

A recent Supreme Court ruling said the authorities should explore the possibility of rehabilitating the occupants, even if they were free to carry out the demolition as ordered by the Bombay High Court. “We have sought the opinion of the Election Commission so that we can follow the Supreme Court order and carry out the demolitions,” a VVMC official said.

The High Court had observed that the buildings were “totally illegal and unauthorized and constructed on land earmarked for a sewage treatment plant and landfill”. She refused to consider regularizing the buildings, as the builder wanted. The deadline to evict the occupants was September 30.

The land in question, part of which was privately owned, measures 30 acres. In 2006, Sitaram Gupta, a former contractor, and his son Arun Gupta began constructing the buildings by producing fake building permits, allegedly obtained from CIDCO, which was the special planning authority for certain areas, and from the VVCMC for one of the buildings. . Sitaram Gupta was arrested in September 2022.

Even though the demolition has stalled, residents of the Jai Ambe Welfare Society continue to live in fear, knowing that it is only temporary. Two organizations, Agri Sena and Hindavi Swaraj Pratishthan, are working to resolve the problem of their rehabilitation.

In the last two years, the VVCMC has registered complaints against over 660 illegal buildings constructed in the Vasai-Virar region. A total of 199 FIRs have been registered against manufacturers.

Asked about the status of these buildings and their residents, additional municipal commissioner Ramesh Manale said it was not possible to rehabilitate thousands of residents. “At present, we are talking to builders and trying to regularize buildings that meet the guidelines issued under the Maharashtra Regional and Town Planning Act,” he said. “We are waiting for indictments to be filed in all 199 cases and for the court to issue its verdict before we can make a decision.”