Buddha
The curse of the poor has struck chief minister Ashok Chavan, social activist Medha Patkar said on Wednesday, referring to the demolition of slum colonies by his government.
Recounting the blatant violations by the neta-babu clique in the Adarsh housing scam, Patkar said that these very people were ruthless when it came to slumdwellers. The women of Mandala slums in Trombay had sent a housing proposal to the CM but he had no time to look at it, she said at a rally organised by the National Alliance for Peoples Movements (NAPM) at Azad Maidan on Wednesday.
We were looked upon with contempt whenever we went to Mantralaya for housing rights for slumdwellers. Chavan would not spare even two minutes for us, Patkar said. She said that the Urban Land Ceiling Act had been repealed despite the fact that a handful of people own 30,000 acres in Mumbai. Cant the government acquire a fraction of this land to house the poor? she asked.
When slumdwellers living by the sea are evicted because they are in the coastal regulation zone, how come Adarsh housing society was permitted in the same zone?, Medha said, adding that the law was used selectively to deprive the poor of their basic right to housing. If roadside hawkers are called encroachers, what do you call officials who reduced a 60-metre road to 18 metres to facilitate Adarsh housing society? she said.
The NAPM has written to Union ministers Pranab Mukherjee and A K Antony, reminding them how the Maharashtra government suppressed the truth right from 2008, when the NAPM had complained about irregularities in Adarsh housing society. The NAPM had got details about the society using the Right to Information (RTI) Act.
Recounting the blatant violations by the neta-babu clique in the Adarsh housing scam, Patkar said that these very people were ruthless when it came to slumdwellers. The women of Mandala slums in Trombay had sent a housing proposal to the CM but he had no time to look at it, she said at a rally organised by the National Alliance for Peoples Movements (NAPM) at Azad Maidan on Wednesday.
We were looked upon with contempt whenever we went to Mantralaya for housing rights for slumdwellers. Chavan would not spare even two minutes for us, Patkar said. She said that the Urban Land Ceiling Act had been repealed despite the fact that a handful of people own 30,000 acres in Mumbai. Cant the government acquire a fraction of this land to house the poor? she asked.
When slumdwellers living by the sea are evicted because they are in the coastal regulation zone, how come Adarsh housing society was permitted in the same zone?, Medha said, adding that the law was used selectively to deprive the poor of their basic right to housing. If roadside hawkers are called encroachers, what do you call officials who reduced a 60-metre road to 18 metres to facilitate Adarsh housing society? she said.
The NAPM has written to Union ministers Pranab Mukherjee and A K Antony, reminding them how the Maharashtra government suppressed the truth right from 2008, when the NAPM had complained about irregularities in Adarsh housing society. The NAPM had got details about the society using the Right to Information (RTI) Act.
Source: The Times India dt 4-11-10
No comments:
Post a Comment