Joshi bent backwards for son-in-law8217;

FEBRUARY 8: Former Chief Minister Manohar Joshi abused his powers during his tenure as the CM in allotting a plot of land reserved for a ...

FEBRUARY 8: Former Chief Minister Manohar Joshi abused his powers during his tenure as the CM in allotting a plot of land reserved for a primary school in Pune to his son-in-law Girish Vyas, alleged Vinod Bobde, counsel for petitioners Nitin Jagtap, councillor of the Pune Municipal Corporation and journalist Vinod Kumbhar.

During arguments before a division bench of the Bombay High Court of Justice B N Srikrishna and Justice S S Parkar, Bobde said the plot at Prabhat Road, Pune was initially reserved for a primary school, but was later handed over to Vyas, a developer, to construct a multi-storied building. According to Bobde, the shifting of reservation violated rule 13.5 of the Development Rules and section 37 of the Maharashtra Regional Town Planning Act.

Bobde told the court that according to the stipulated procedures, if shifting of reservation is to be done, objections should be invited from the public before the planning authorities. He said that the proposal is then placed before the GeneralBody of the corporation and then before the state cabinet. 8220;But Vyas has surpassed all procedures and directly approached the Urban Development Department and got the proposal passed and all this has been done at the behest of Joshi by his suboridinates8221;, he said while reading the affidavit of Deputy Secretary, Urban Development Vidyadhar Deshpande.

Justice Srikrishna said, 8220;These are all correspondences made by sub-ordinates and if any important decision should be taken, concurrence of the Finance Department must be taken and in exceptional cases, the decision of the cabinet must be taken, in this case there are only correspondences by sub-ordinates8221; and added that he was too much bothered about matter.

Bobde alleged that Joshi had made a noting in the file pertaining to his son-in-law that about the proposed shifting of reservation there would be no objection to take all actions according to the rules. He alleged that Joshi had instructed his sub-ordinates to pass the order in favour of hisson-in-law. Bobde said that one building was already constructed and is occupied by residents while stay was granted on the other building on the same land by former Chief Justice M B Shah and Justice S Radhakrishnan. The court had directed the PMC not to issue completion certificates.

Bobde said that power was abused when the reservation was shifted to Lohagaon and then it was cancelled. He further said that the developer Vyas was ready to give an amount of Rs 25 lakh for the construction of the school building. Bobde said that there was a condition put forward before Vyas that first he should construct the school building and then a completion certificate would be issued. But later the decision was changed as Vyas was allowed to deposit an amount of Rs 25 lakh and a completion certificate would be issued. Reading the affidavits of former PMC chief Ramnath Jha and city engineer Madhav Harihar, Bobde said that it is clearly stated that they had made their position clear to the government that in the pastsuch a compromise has never been done. Thus the government has kept the public in the dark, he alleged.