Maharashtra panel to fix defects in house allotment to tenants of dilapidated cess buildings

The Mumbai Building Repairs and Reconstruction Board, an undertaking of the Maharashtra Housing and Area Development Authority, is the custodian of the cess buildings in the island city. The board collects a repair cess from the buildings. If the repair costs exceed the funds, the buildings are declared as “beyond economical repair” under section 88(3)(a) of the Maharashtra Housing and Area Development Act and are taken up for reconstruction or redevelopment.

The new committee will be led by retired bureaucrat Suresh Kumar and have two nominated individuals and the board’s assistant chief officer. It will carry out a detailed study of the defects in the allotment process for transit houses and master-list houses. It has also been asked to remove the defects, and suggest new ways to improve the system, as per the housing department, which issued a government resolution in this regard on January 17.

Every year before the monsoon, the board carries out a virtual survey of thousands of cess buildings, many of which are over half a century old. Such dilapidated buildings, if declared C1 (extremely dangerous), are vacated by the authority, which also offers alternative transit accommodation to the occupants.

Since these cess buildings cannot often be redeveloped owing to space constraints and other issues, a master list of affected tenants is prepared and they are given accommodation in redeveloped buildings approved under Development Control Regulation 33(7).