Rent paid regularly, still thrown out!

Family evicted from disused civic dispensary after 3 years of paying rent to ward committee member

For three years, a family of six lived illegally in a property owned by the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) in Yerawada. Well, that happens, you might think.

But what is unusual in this case is that the family, which was evicted yesterday, said it was paying rent to occupy the property, a municipal dispensary till three years ago.

The family claimed the rooms had been rented out to it by a person called Anil Rathod and that he was an elected member of the PMC's local ward committee. The family requested anonymity.

Civic drive
Officers of the PMC along with a police team evicted the six people occupying the premises and threw out their belongings during an anti-encroachment drive in Yerawada.

Dr R R Pardesh, acting medical officer, said the property concerned had ceased to be a dispensary a few years ago. "We had handed it over to the Urban Community Development department and presumed some anganwadi project or such might be running there," said Pardeshi. "We don't know what happened later."

N D Gandhire, deputy engineer, Sangamwadi ward office, who was part of the eviction team, said he did not find any documentary evidence of any official projects being run from the property.

"As far as we know, it was a property of the PMC that had fallen into disuse, because we didn't find any records of any project being run there," said Gandhire. "Yes, until some years ago it used to be a dispensary, but why the UCD department let this property rot and fall into the wrong hands we don't know."

Inquiry unlikely
He said he, too, had heard the rumour that the ward committee member had rented out the property to the family, but said there was no documentary proof.

The PMC seems reluctant to conduct an inquiry into the illegal letting out of PMC properties, and content with getting the property back.

"Our procedure is to remove any encroachments and reclaim our property, which we have done," said ward officer Mukund Bhosale