The brazen attack on the Express team investigating illegal properties owned by Delhi politicians does not surprise us. Such strong-arm tactics are entirely in character with a mafia that has bent every bye-law in the book to build empires, even as the country’s Capital was run to the ground. For the first time in decades, they are actually feeling the heat. The intimidation we have faced as a newspaper is heartening evidence of that. We, on our part, will keep the heat on. This demolition story is not about the poor being deprived of a roof over their head, although some may choose to conveniently sing that number. It is about some of the Capital’s best known faces, people who have for years posed as Delhi’s guardians and who have won elections in that guise, using their political clout to get away with what can only be termed as daylight robbery. Their arrogant venality stares the citizen in the face at every street corner: buildings with extra floors, shops eating into public land, schools with illegal basements, the evidence of their powerful elbow is ubiquitous. These people may owe their allegiance to the Congress, the BJP, or some other political party, it doesn’t make too much of a difference. Ultimately, they owe their allegiance only to their pockets. It is remarkable how similar were their responses when confronted: the whole of Delhi is unauthorised so why pick on us, is the brazen query. It is fortuitous that in two of the country’s biggest metropolises the high courts have spoken against this urban malaise that citizens had long recognised but felt powerless to address. The Bombay High Court had in April ordered the demolition of 855 illegal structures in Ulhasnagar. In December, the Delhi High Court directed the removal of 18,271 buildings that violated the Master Plan. The two judgments taken together represent judicial recognition of the damage the builders’ mafia, in cahoots with municipal authorities, have perpetrated on the country’s cities and citizens. What we need now is a master plan to end the builder-mafia’s reign for all time.
