Circular Prohibits Denial Of Flats On Basis Of Origin, ET RealEstate
MUMBAI: Following a police complaint last week by Trupti Devrukhkar (35) against the Shiv Sadan Cooperative Housing Society in Mulund for declining to give her office space because she was a Maharashtrian, deputy registrar of cooperative societies of ‘T’ ward M B Mhaske issued a circular to managing committee members of all housing societies not to deny membership on the basis of caste, religion, language and sex, among other things.
The circular followed letters from MP Manoj Kotak and Mulund MLA Mihir Kotecha. The deputy registrar’s office said the Constitution as well as the Maharashtra Cooperative Societies Act, 1960, made it illegal to discriminate against anyone or impose impractical restrictions or conditions.
Experts said the registrar had all the powers to award membership to any victim of discrimination by following the legal provisions.
In the Mira Road advertisement that bore the tagline ‘Preferred for Marwari and Gujarati family’, there were photographs of high-rises but no mention of the builder’s name. MNS activists said that while the advertisement did not say anything about not selling flats to Maharashtrians, it displayed a preference for Marwaris and Gujaratis.
The activists alleged that the advertisement of the newly launched flats was for Sonam Builders, owned by Mira Road MLA Geeta Jain’s family. Jain submitted an application to the police on Sunday saying the high-rises shown in the advertisement did not belong to Sonam Builders.
She said that several buildings had been constructed by Sonam Builders in Mira-Bhayander and spaces there sold to people from all communities, including Maharashtrians.
The MNS activists said they had posed as customers and approached the salespersons on the mobile phone number mentioned in the advertisement, and they spoke about selling the flats to a particular community.
Harshit Rajput from Millions Acre, while apologising to Thackeray, took responsibility for the post. He said they were looking at Gujarati and Marwadi customers merely as a target audience and had no intention of hurting anyone.
